The purpose of this thesis is to analyse the conditions of designing a technical solution (ICT) to assist everyday life in the home, in four objectives. First, to identify and analyse the everyday practice in terms of home-related values and activities. Second, to analyse a model for a technical and organizational developed ICT-solution in a local community. Third, to analyse the opportunities and dilemmas of ICT as a support system for everyday life, and fourth, to discuss how actors in society can interact with households in making daily life work The method of the thesis takes support in a so-called interactive research and aims to fulfill both the scientific quality criteria as well as requirements of relevancy for the practice. The thesis outlines a theoretical understanding of the individual construction of the home, based on everyday practice taking place in the home and neighbourhood, in an expanding residential landscape. The empirical parts of the thesis derive from two studies. The Husum study examines issues such as what a home is represented by, and what can be said to constitute a good home. The Vällingby study is analysing a model of a technical and organized ICT-solution in an experiment-house in a suburb to Stockholm. In this thesis ICT reinforces the home as a hub for everyday life. Households increase their flexibility and accessibility, support the relationship between people and strengthen the influence and a local foundation. ICT also creates new roles for actors in local society and evens out the landscape of everyday life.

The general aim of the present thesis is to expand knowledge about the everyday lives of the oldest old (85+) living independently and to improve and deepen the understanding of their doings and possession and use of technology. The everyday lives of the oldest old represent, in many aspects an under-researched area, partly because this age group is seldom included in national surveys regarding living conditions and time use. This thesis comprises four papers. In paper I the extent and direction of research regarding elderly people is investigated through an examination of articles published in six well-reputed and well-established occupational therapy journals. Fifteen percent of the articles published between 2001 and 2006 included elderly people to some extent. Only five articles were about the oldest old. Most articles had a quantitative approach and concerned instrument development and testing. The findings show that articles concerning the oldest old are sparse, especially regarding their subjective experience. The following three papers are based on data derived from an empirical project based on interviews and observations with 18 oldest old individuals. Paper II explores how individuals over 85 years of age themselves describe and experience daily life. „Doing everyday life‟ is described through five overarching themes: „Experiencing being old‟, „Doings in everyday life‟, „Patterns of the day‟, „Altered doings‟ and „The importance of time‟. The daily doings are described as consisting of the usual things that have always been done, although how the doings are performed have changed. To do something is stressed as important for well-being, and a strong motivation to manage everyday doings on one‟s own is expressed. Paper III explores and describes the experiences and relations to technology in everyday doings of the oldest old as they themselves describe it. Four categories; „Perception of technology‟, „Technology holdings‟, „Handling technology‟ and „Compensatory technology in old age‟ emerged from the material. Technology needs to be integrated into the daily routines for it to be used. A modest and pragmatic attitude towards technology stands out, showing a discrepancy with public policy, which implies that technology will enhance independence and participation for elderly people. In paper IV, data from a younger group (-85) is included to describe, compare and discuss how elderly people belonging to different age cohorts (-85 and 85+) relate to their physical environment, primarily technological objects used in the home, and to examine how this is influenced by experiences and possession of technology over the life course. Possession and use of technological objects are similar for both groups over the life course from the parental home through the family time, although in the senior citizen time differences in technology possession and use appear. At higher ages the chronological age becomes a factor in deciding about upgrading or downsizing of the technology room; this is described as an „aging turn‟. The conclusions drawn are that to continue and perform the everyday doings as one has always done is important in old age. At high ages downsizing of the technology rooms is an important issue and new technological objects need to be incorporated in everyday doings in order to be used and perceived as beneficial.

In the wake of deinstitutionalization, people with psychiatric disabilities are, to a great extent, living in the community. In this thesis everyday life of people with psychiatric disabilities, living in independent housing with community-based social support to manage their daily life, is investigated. Special attention is paid to the characteristics and meaning of community-based social support. Through participating observational studies, interviews and time-geographic diaries, data have been gathered about everyday life of seventeen men and women. It is the interpersonal social conditions that have been the main target of the study, addressed as social networks and social support. Everyday life conditions are dependent on social as well as physical and material circumstances. Although the social conditions are emphasized in the study they are not looked upon as isolated dimensions but as part of everyday life circumstances. The everyday life perspective offers an opportunity to reveal the structures within which everyday life takes place. The time-geographic concepts “community-organized projects” and “individual-organized projects” were used to investigate the structures of everyday life, resulting in four substructures. Four types of everyday life and four patterns of networks connected to the different substructures were identified, showing great variations. The characteristics of community-based social support can be summarized as “the doing”, “the talking” and “the being with” in a reciprocal type of relationship. The meaning of support is shortly described as solution of and relieving problems, social companionship, security, protection and control. Community-based social support show similar importance regardless of the type of everyday life when it comes to solution of problems and different importance when it comes to aspects of support such as social companionship.

I vårt arbete med palliativa patienter har vi sett en kunskapsbrist i hur patienters existentiella behov bemöts. Det saknas tid för att lyssna på patienterna och tillgodose de existentiella behoven. Det finns en risk att medikalisera de existentiella behoven istället för att bemöta dem. Uppsatsens syfte var att, baserat på självbiografier, belysa patienters existentiella behov i livets slut. En självbiografistudie genomfördes för att få belyst vilka de existentiella behoven var. En narrativ analysmetod användes. Fyra huvudkategorier framträdde; Behov av att känna tillit, behov av att ha en tro på något, behov av att få leva ett vardagsliv och behov av livet som går vidare. Familjen, de nära vännerna och att ges möjlighet att leva vardagsliv var det mest framträdande. Även tillit till personalen var viktigt. Patienter som hade en tro behöll denna till slutet, trots att inga under skedde. Vardagslivet tillsammans med familj och vänner var det som uppskattades mest och som gav störst tillfredsställelse vid livets slut. / In our work with patients in end of life we have seen a lack of knowledge in how we respond to the existential needs. Also there is a lack of time in listening to the patients when they want to express their existential needs. It is so much easier to give sedatives to comfort the patients instead of taking the time and effort to listen to the extential needs. The aim of this study was, based on autobiographies, to examine patients existential needs in end-of-life. In order to find out what needs they had we read autobiographies. The analysis was performed with a narrative method. Four main-categories were found; Need of confidence, need to have a faith in something, need to live a everyday-life and need of life that goes on. The family, close friends and the everyday-life was very important. Also the confidence for the caregivers was of significance. Patients who had a faith kept their faith to the end of life, inspite that there was no miracle. Everyday-life with family and friends at home was the most appreciated in end-of-life.

This paper focuses on how interior decoration and taste was seen and taught in relation to the vision of the ideal home in 1940s Sweden. Two phenomena that are focused on are surveys of how people actually lived, and the attempts made to alter that way of living. The activities of Svenska Slöjdföreningen (SSF, the Swedish Society of Industrial Design) is used as a prism for discerning the discourse on domestic interior reform, and the study consists of a close reading and analysis based on archival material and publications linked to SSF. Part of the archival material consists of survey protocols and photograph, of Swedish homes, from a survey into “dwelling habits” initiated by the Association of Swedish Architects (SAR) and the SSF. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, these kinds of surveys were made in order to analyse the standard of living, and the usage of homes and furniture with the aim to find adequate ways of building better housing, of producing better furniture, and of educating people to be more modern and enlightened consumers and home-makers. Based on these findings, courses were given on how to furnish and decorate the home. Through courses in how to furnish and decorate the home, the ideal home was to become real. I mean that the concept of “taste” was almost as important as the concept of “home” in the vision of what modern Swedish society should be like, but that manifesting “good taste” in the home in the 1940s meant something more than merely creating an aesthetically pleasing or beautiful interior. Taste was, above all, seen as an indicator of the degree of modernity and social awareness of people.

The aim of this study is to draw attention to the fact that daily practices which tend to be overlooked due to their taken for grantedness actually signify power coming into existence here and now as well as that everyday problems bring along accordingly ordinary coping ways. In this respect, resistance in everyday life means a refusal that does not identify itself as political and organized, and who intends to make do with the rule by finding immediate and effective solutions to negative effects power generates rather than overtly challenging it. In order to render visible this type of resistance, to understand how it is experienced and perceived, the implementation of smoking ban in enclosed areas was covered in entertainment venues. Participant observations and semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted in Nevizade Street that is located in Beyoglu district of Istanbul and consists of meyhanes as well as beerhouses. Although customers resist based on pleasure principle, managers in order not to go bankrupt and employees not to fall out of work, it is concluded that what is thwarted here is not public health that the related law aims to protect but rather the troubles that the implementation of the law brings about.

No description available.

This thesis considers ordinary Swedish teenagers and their everyday use of,and views on, music. The aim of the study is to analyse the relationship between identity and adolescents’ use of music in their daily lives. Theories are employed that hold identity to be a process, and that comprise the social as well as the psychological aspects of the individual (Giddens,1991; 1997; Jenkins, 2008). Since for both Giddens and Jenkins the reflexive identity process takes place in everyday life, it is a concept that is essential to this study. The idea that people are active, not passive, in their day-to-day use of cultural products ultimately leads to Small’s (1998) definition of musicking. The empirical part of the study was carried out among fifteen eighthgraders (14–15 years) in two schools in two Swedish cities. An initial questionnaire provided outlines of the adolescents’ musical preferences, and were followed by focus group conversations centred on six music examples. Later, interviews were carried out to chart the informants’ individual relationships with music and their personal use of it. The material is analysed thematically in three chapters on music and ‘them’, music and ‘us’, and music and ‘me’. In the final chapter, a competent musicking agency is held to be a combinationof individual and social factors. Whether these aspects can coexist boils down to the question of authenticity: much like Giddens’s competent agent, the competent musicking agent moves between life sectors, maintaining balance between uniqueness and normality, and is therefore perceived as authentic by both herself and others. In school, pupils tend to choose music that promotes their public image. Instead of yielding to a tussle between self-image and public image, it is suggested that music education should become a free zone where the well known is looked at in newways, and where one could get to know the unknown.

Syftet med studien var att beskriva det dagliga livet för yngre kvinnor med urininkontinens. Sju stycken kvinnor intervjuades och en öppen fråga ställdes för att få fram studiens syfte. Kvalitativ innehållsanalys genom Lundman & Hällgren Graneheim(2012) användes som analysmetod. Studiens resultat visade att urininkontinens förde med sig en rad konsekvenser för den unga kvinnan. I det dagliga livet innebar det att livet blev mindre aktivt och då var det främst påverkan på den fysiska aktiviteten kvinnorna tog upp och upplevde som ett problem. Upplevelsen att känna sig ensam, okvinnlig och mindre sexuellt attraktiv förekom och rädslan fanns ständigt där att läckaget skulle upptäckas. Kvinnan låg steget före och tänkte förebyggande genom att planlägga vart toaletter fanns, dricka minimalt och anpassa sin klädsel. Urininkontinens upplevdes svårt att prata om och var inget självklart som delades med sin närmaste familj eller vänner. Sammanfattningsvis blev konsekvenserna och anpassningarna att den unga kvinnan med urininkontinens levde i ständig beredskap i vardagen. / The aim of the study was to describe the daily lives of younger women with urinary incontinence. Seven women were interviewed and one open question was asked to produce the study's purpose. Qualitative content analysis by Hällgren Graneheim & Lundman (2012) was used as the analysis method. The study results showed that urinary incontinence entailed a number of consequences for the young woman. In daily life it meant that life became less active and then it was mainly the effect on the physical activity women took up and experienced as a problem. Experience to feel alone, unfeminine and less sexually attractive occurred and the fear was constantly there that the leakage could be detected. The woman thought prevention by designing their everyday lives. Urinary incontinence was experienced hard to talk about and were no obvious shared with their immediate family or friends. In summary, the consequences and the adjustments to the young woman with urinary incontinence lived in constant readiness in everyday life.

ADHD is one of the most common behavioral disorders diagnosed in children. These children have difficulties regarding the regulation of emotions, maintaining attention and impulse control, all of which influence family and social life. The aim of this study was to describe and explore the everyday life of families with a child with ADHD and public health nurses’ role in relation to these families. The parents were contending with- and adapting to the parental role and social network. The family attempted to safeguard a functioning family in managing their everyday life, tuning themselves in on the child’s shifting moods, using strict boundaries and developing special skills. The family fought for acceptance and inclusion when interacting with their social network and professionals. Parents with ADHD and families with non-medicated children reported more problems in family functioning. Characteristics in parents and the child with ADHD, as well as support from the social network and community health services, all influenced family functioning. The PHNs described their role as both a peripheral and collaborating partner, asking for guidelines and multidisciplinary collaboration. The public health nurse is in a unique position to support and supervise these families. / Aim: The overall aim of this thesis was to describe and explore everyday life in families with a child with ADHD and public health nurses’ role in relation to these families. Methods: An explorative and descriptive design with qualitative and quantitative methods was used. In Study I, data was collected with individual interviews with nine parents, and analyzed using phenomenology. In Study II, the data was collected with individual interviews with 17 family members, and analyzed with phenomenography. In Study III, data was collected with a questionnaire responded by 265 parents, and analyzed with statistics. In Study IV, data was collected with group- and individual interviews with 19 public health nurses, and analyzed with phenomenography.                                                                                                  Main findings: The families’ everyday life was influenced by living in unpredictability, though they were striving for predictability. The experience of being a parent was described as contending and adapting every day, like windsurfing in unpredictable waters (I). The family tried to safeguard a functioning family in managing their everyday life and developing special skills, within the family and the society. They fought for acceptance and inclusion in relation to the social network and professionals (II). Parents’ sense of coherence, children’s behavior, support from social networks and community health services had all an impact on family functioning (III). The PHNs described their role as both a peripheral and a collaborating partner and they asked for guidelines and multidisciplinary collaboration (IV). Conclusions: Everyday life in families with ADHD is both demanding and giving. Acceptance and support from the social network and supervision from the professionals are essential. The public health nurse is in a unique position to support and supervise these families.