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This study investigates environmental signals of early mining activities in Garpenberg by analysing sediment core samples from three lakes: Gruvsjön, Stora Jälken, and Trehörningen. In addition, a comparison between two methods for analysing the geochemical composition of lake sediment, energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence (ED-XRF) and wavelength dispersive X-ray fluorescence (WD-XRF) was conducted for Gruvsjön. Age-depth models for the sediment profiles was conducted by matching known peaks in historical atmospheric Pb-pollution as points of reference together with the introduction of Norway spruce (Picea abies) pollen in Gruvsjön, and lake formation in Stora Jälken and Trehörningen. The earliest signs of mining activity in Gruvsjön date back to approximately 300-500 CE, as evidenced by the gradual increase in Zn levels. Similarly, the earliest signs of anthropogenic influence in Stora Jälken are around 500 CE, likely related to Zn extraction. However, the absence of changes in other mining-related elements suggests that the observed geochemical shifts in Pb, Cu, Fe, Br and Ti must be explained by other factors. Furthermore, no clear evidence of local mining was identified around Trehörningen. Hence, the observed geochemical changes in this lakes sediment record were attributed to other anthropogenic influences such as damming and agriculture. Lastly, the method comparison between ED-XRF and WD-XRF demonstrates a high degree of coherence for most of the tested elements from the sedimentprofile from Gruvsjön.

In 2016, 12.3% of households in the United States (U.S), or 15.6 million people, were food insecure during some part of the year. Food insecurity is more prevalent among households with children, and has been shown to have adverse effects on child development, aggressive behavior, psycho-social development, and academic performance. Nutrition assistance and education programs play critical roles in alleviating food insecurity. The Virginia 365 Project (VA365) was a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)-funded multi-level school- and home-based approach aimed at reducing food insecurity in low-income areas of Virginia through meal programs and nutrition education for parents through the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education Program (SNAP-Ed). Impacts of coordinated nutrition assistance programs for children have generally focused on food security or nutrition outcomes, not broader impacts on academic achievement, attendance, and aggressive behavior. This study examined the feasibility of using school-level surveillance data, collected in state longitudinal data systems, to detect changes in academic and behavioral outcomes, using the VA365 program as a case study. Relevant data indicators were identified and compared from the Virginia Longitudinal Data System and from the longitudinal data systems from other Mid-Atlantic region (MARO) SNAP-Ed states (n=9) to determine generalizability to other states for broader program impacts. Results provide a greater understanding of the potential for accessing existing school-level data to document the public value of school-based nutrition programs beyond improved food security and dietary intake to include academic achievement, discipline and attendance outcomes. / Master of Science / In 2016, 15.6 million Americans were food insecure, or struggled to get safe and consistent access to food, during some part of the year. Food insecurity is more common in households with children. It can have negative outcomes on a child’s development, behavior, psycho-social development, and grades. The Virginia 365 Project (VA365) was a federally funded approach to reducing food insecurity in children located in low-income areas of Virginia through a combination of free school meals, food backpack programs, and nutrition education. The goal of this study was to determine the feasibility of using data already collected by schools to assess impacts of this anti-hunger program on student behavior, attendance, and academic achievement. All schools collect data as part of the Virginia Longitudinal Data System. We analyzed data that were collected as part of this system as well as other states around Virginia to determine how and if they could be used to describe the benefits of the program. The results of this study may help researchers understand the potential of this approach to investigating the broader impacts of nutrition programs beyond nutrition and food insecurity outcomes.

In recent decades in Newfoundland, a sustained interest in Christian symbols, stories, and values has been paired with increasing criticism of Christian religious institutions and agents. Newfoundlands burgeoning tradition of professional humour has reflected this changing set of relationships to Christianity. This robust young humour tradition richly reflects the ongoing pluralization and secularization of Newfoundland culture, and abundantly exemplifies humours distinctive potential as a means of addressing potentially contentious or vexing issues. Yet, surprisingly, literary criticism has almost entirely avoided the prominent stream of Newfoundland humour that addresses the islands religious legacy.<p>This project aims to begin to correct this substantial critical omission, examining points of continuity among a number of works produced over the past four decades. It focuses on the works embrace of political and/or epistemological pluralism, typically married to religious skepticism and to misgivings about conventional arrangements of religious power. Chapter One provides an historical and critical context for the project, introduces subsequent chapters, and speculates on ramifications of the pluralistic current that runs through the works in the study. Chapter Two examines religious jokes in Newfoundland joke books. It emphasizes the jokes overall tendency toward (an often ambiguous) religious conservatism, as well as the books latent pluralism regarding interdenominational relations. Chapter Three focuses on journalist and playwright Ray Guys often fierce satire of Christian religious agents and institutions. It argues that Guys satire utterly rejects the legitimacy of religious authority in the civic realm, largely on the grounds that transcendent truthfulness is often invoked as a means of justifying otherwise objectionable power. Chapter Four explores the ecumenical religious humour of columnist and memoirist Ed Smith. It focuses on Smiths playful efforts to harmonize Christian faith and practice with a measure of religious uncertainty presented as a necessary foundation for humane coexistence. Chapter Five examines Ed Kavanaghs novel The Confessions of Nipper Mooney. Primarily, it explicates and examines the novels liberal favouring of the individual moral conscience, and the symbolic association of its religiously dissident and/or marginalized protagonists with elements of the Catholic tradition. Chapter Six discusses Berni Stapletons comic play The Pope and Princess Di. The chapter emphasizes the plays presentation of symbols constant subjection to alteration and hybridization, and its cautious regard for valuable symbols (religious or otherwise) that nonetheless become destructive when viewed as sacrosanct.<p>Chapter Seven concludes the study by considering the works participation in political, philosophical, and literary/dramatic movements that problematize long-established religious modes and support a secular-pluralist outlook. It reflects on the role of humour in movements for change and on didacticism and popular humour as features of publicly engaged literature; it discusses other works of Newfoundland humour that approach religious matters from similarly secular, though less overtly political, angles; and it speculates on some social implications of the ascendancy of liberal, pluralistic values, considering these Newfoundland works in a more general Canadian cultural context.

In recent decades in Newfoundland, a sustained interest in Christian symbols, stories, and values has been paired with increasing criticism of Christian religious institutions and agents. Newfoundlands burgeoning tradition of professional humour has reflected this changing set of relationships to Christianity. This robust young humour tradition richly reflects the ongoing pluralization and secularization of Newfoundland culture, and abundantly exemplifies humours distinctive potential as a means of addressing potentially contentious or vexing issues. Yet, surprisingly, literary criticism has almost entirely avoided the prominent stream of Newfoundland humour that addresses the islands religious legacy.<p>This project aims to begin to correct this substantial critical omission, examining points of continuity among a number of works produced over the past four decades. It focuses on the works embrace of political and/or epistemological pluralism, typically married to religious skepticism and to misgivings about conventional arrangements of religious power. Chapter One provides an historical and critical context for the project, introduces subsequent chapters, and speculates on ramifications of the pluralistic current that runs through the works in the study. Chapter Two examines religious jokes in Newfoundland joke books. It emphasizes the jokes overall tendency toward (an often ambiguous) religious conservatism, as well as the books latent pluralism regarding interdenominational relations. Chapter Three focuses on journalist and playwright Ray Guys often fierce satire of Christian religious agents and institutions. It argues that Guys satire utterly rejects the legitimacy of religious authority in the civic realm, largely on the grounds that transcendent truthfulness is often invoked as a means of justifying otherwise objectionable power. Chapter Four explores the ecumenical religious humour of columnist and memoirist Ed Smith. It focuses on Smiths playful efforts to harmonize Christian faith and practice with a measure of religious uncertainty presented as a necessary foundation for humane coexistence. Chapter Five examines Ed Kavanaghs novel The Confessions of Nipper Mooney. Primarily, it explicates and examines the novels liberal favouring of the individual moral conscience, and the symbolic association of its religiously dissident and/or marginalized protagonists with elements of the Catholic tradition. Chapter Six discusses Berni Stapletons comic play The Pope and Princess Di. The chapter emphasizes the plays presentation of symbols constant subjection to alteration and hybridization, and its cautious regard for valuable symbols (religious or otherwise) that nonetheless become destructive when viewed as sacrosanct.<p>Chapter Seven concludes the study by considering the works participation in political, philosophical, and literary/dramatic movements that problematize long-established religious modes and support a secular-pluralist outlook. It reflects on the role of humour in movements for change and on didacticism and popular humour as features of publicly engaged literature; it discusses other works of Newfoundland humour that approach religious matters from similarly secular, though less overtly political, angles; and it speculates on some social implications of the ascendancy of liberal, pluralistic values, considering these Newfoundland works in a more general Canadian cultural context.

Denna undersökning har syftat till att undersöka hur AI anses kunna påverka undervisningen i skolan och samhällskunskapsämnet. Studien baseras på den diskurs som råder inom ämnet. Undersökningen baseras på material i form av tidningsartiklar, en intervju med en forskare och en fokusgruppsintervju. Materialet har analyserats genom en kvantitativ respektive kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Undersökningen utgår från uppfattningen att samhällskunskapsundervisningen bör sträva efter att utveckla så kallad AI-literacy hos eleverna. Resultatet bekräftade inte att detta genomförs i undervisningen. Områden som undervisning, fusk, examination och bedömning behandlades i större utsträckning än AI-literacy, AIED (AI in education) och AI&amp;ED (AI and education).  Resultatet antyder att AI-utvecklingen kommer leda till nya examinationsformer och möjligen AI-assistenter som kompletterar lärare. Samhällskunskap som undervisningsämne omnämndes knappt i materialet även om vissa områden som kan relateras till samhällskunskap förekom som källkritik och demokrati. AI-literacy relaterat till samhällskunskap förekom några enstaka gånger. Detta resultat påvisar viken av att utveckla AI:s roll i samhällskunskapsundervinsingen för att möjliggöra säkra studier av ämnet i skolan, samt vikten av att fortsätta forska om AI och utbildning och AI och samhällskunskap. / This survey aims to investigate how AI is considered to influence teaching in school and the social studies subject. The survey is based on the discourse on the subject of AI and education. The survey is based on material from online news articles, an interview with a researcher and a focus group interview. The material has been analyzed through quantitative and qualitative content analysis methods. The survey is based on a theory that claims that social studies teaching should strive to develop students so-called AI-literacy. The survey results did not confirm this theory. Categories such as teaching, cheating, examination and assessment were covered in the material to a greater extent than AI literacy, AIED (AI in education) and AI&amp;ED (AI and education). The results suggests that the development in AI may lead to new forms of examination and possibly AI assistants as a supplement to teachers. Social studies as a teaching subject was barely mentioned in the material, although certain areas that can be related to social studies appeared such as source criticism and democracy. AI literacy related to social studies appeared a few times. This result demonstrates the importance of further research about AI and social studies education to and to enable safe methods to study the subject in schools. It also emphasizes the importance of continued research on AI and education as well as AI and social studies.

Prior to writing our thesis, a course at the Royal institute of technology allowed alternative methods to present our knowledge. We decided to create a podcast. During the process of creating the podcast we started discussing how the examiner would assess this compared to our peers creating written solutions. This resulted in three questions that later became our research questions: How does written versus podcast affect the grading from teachers and teacher students? What parameters should be considered when creating a task for written and podcast? What is the general view among teachers for using pupil-generated podcasts? To answer these questions, we created an experiment and a survey. The experiment aimed to answer the first two questions and gave us the following results: by only altering the format between podcast and written, our participants assessing the podcast were more keen to give forward and comprehensive feedback, while our participants assessing written focused more on what was missing and commented on small details. The second research question was answered by analyzing the task we created for our experiment. We found that source integration is needed to reduce confusion. The survey implies that no teachers were against using pupil-generated podcasts but STEM teachers were more picky on how and when it can be implemented. We hope that this thesis inspires further research in the relatively new area of pupil/student-generated podcasts. / Innan vi skrev vårt examensarbete tillät en kurs vid Kungliga tekniska högskolan alternativa metoder för att presentera vår kunskap. Vi bestämde oss för att skapa en podcast. Under processen med att skapa podcasten började vi diskutera hur examinatorn skulle bedöma detta jämfört med våra kurskamrater som skapade skriftliga lösningar. Detta resulterade i tre frågor som senare blev våra forskningsfrågor: Hur påverkar skriftligt kontra podcast bedömningen från lärare och lärarstudenter? Hur kan en uppgift skapas för att fungera för både podcast och skriftlig bedömning? Vad är den allmänna uppfattningen bland lärare kring att använda elevgenererade podcasts? För att svara på dessa frågor skapade vi ett experiment och en enkät. Experimentet ämnade till att svara på de två första frågorna och gav oss följande resultat: genom att bara ändra formatet mellan podcast och skrift, hade våra deltagare som bedömde podcasten mer fokuspå att ge forward feedback och mer övergripande feedback, medan våra deltagare som bedömde skriftligt fokuserade mer på vad som saknades och kommenterade på smådetaljer. Den andra forskningsfrågan besvarades genom att analysera den uppgift vi skapade för vårt experiment. Vi fann att ett bättre arbetssätt gällande källor behövs för att minska förvirring. Enkäten antyder att inga lärare var emot att använda elevers genererade podcasts menSTEM-lärare var mer kräsna på hur och när det kan implementeras. Vi hoppas att detta examensarbete inspirerar till ytterligare forskning inom det relativt nya området: elev- och studentgenererade podcasts.

Exhaustion disorder (ED) is a Swedish criteria-based medical diagnosis related to burnout, that often requires long term rehabilitation and sick leave. Comorbidity of functional gastrointestinal (GI) problems and ED has been reported and may be mediated by dysregulated vagal function. This study aimed to explore whether vagus nerve regulation evaluated with the vagal estimate Heart rate recovery (HRR60s), is quadratically associated with severity of ED, affective, GI symptoms/diagnoses, and work ability, using data from a randomized controlled trial. On baseline 16.1% of participants (n = 155) showed attenuated (&lt;25 beats/minute) or fast HRR60s (&gt;51 beats/minute) (82.6/17.4% women/men; N = 161; M = 43yrs; SD = 8.5). Controlling for effects of BMI, fitness (Vo2max), age and sex all subjects were in the HRR60s range defined as normal (27-47, n = 152). The explanatory power of cross-sectional correlations where similar using a quadratic and a linear model. The main hypothesis was therefore not supported. Within-subject analyses showed a tendency that longitudinal increase in HRR60s was associated with a decrease in burnout symptoms up to a certain tip-point, where it contrariwise was associated with higher ratings. Lower prevalence of GI symptoms/diagnoses than in earlier publications indicate that these may be underreported in data. In conclusion preliminary results suggest that evaluating HRR60s in ED using an inverted U-shaped model of cardiac vagal regulation may add information of stage, degree of severity of ED and progress of treatment on an individual basis, which may not be transparent in cross-sectional analysis. / Utmattningssyndrom (ED) är en svensk kriterie-baserad diagnos som ofta kräver långvarig rehabilitering och sjukskrivning. Komorbiditet mellan ED och gastrointestinala (GI) symtom har rapporterats och kan vara medierade av dysreglerad vagusaktivitet. Denna studie avsåg att undersöka om vagusreglering utvärderad med Heart rate recovery (HRR60s) är kvadratiskt associerad med grad av ED, emotionella, GI symtom/diagnoser och arbetsförmåga, med data från en randomiserad kontrollerad studie. 16.1% av deltagarna (n = 155) hade låg (&lt;25 hjärtslag/minut) eller hög HRR60s (&gt;51 hjärtslag/minut) vid första mättillfället (82.6/17.4% kvinnor/män; N = 161; M = 43yrs; SD = 8.5). Mätvärden kontrollerade för BMI, fitness (Vo2max), ålder och kön låg alla inom definierad normalvariation (HRR60s 27-47, n = 152). Förklaringsgraden i tvärsnittsanalys var likartad för en linjär och kvadratisk modell. Resultatet stödde därmed inte huvudhypotesen. Upprepade mätningar per individ visade en tendens till att HRR60s som ökade longitudinellt var associerat med minskade utmattningssymtom upp till en brytpunkt, där de istället associerades med högre värden. I studien var prevalensen för GI-symtom lägre än tidigare visats för ED, vilket indikerar att det kan finnas en underrapportering i data. Sammantaget tyder preliminärt resultat på att en inverterad kvadratisk modell av hjärtvagusreglering utvärderad med HRR60s kan bidra med information om fas, grad av ED och behandlingsprogress på individnivå, som inte blir transparent vid tvärsnittsanalys.