Text: Essi Kähkönen
Photos: Sami Mannerheimo

Early childhood experiences of stress have a significant impact on the later development of the brain’s neural networks. The roots of many neuropsychiatric disorders, such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), appear to lie in early childhood and experiences of high stress at that time.

Stress and negative emotional experiences affect the brain’s limbic system and especially the amygdala – the parts of the brain that regulate our emotions, social behaviour and emotional learning.

“Strong experiences of stress can make the person susceptible to symptoms at a later age.”

“Strong experiences of stress can leave a memory trace in the brain’s limbic neural networks and make the person susceptible to symptoms at a later age,” explains research director Sari Lauri of the University of Helsinki.

Early stress can make you ill

Young people who have previously experienced an early high level of stress, caused by events such as domestic violence, have been found to suffer from depression, diverse phobias, generalised anxiety and anger management issues, for example.

According to Lauri, childhood stress alone is not likely to cause later symptoms, but early negative experiences are a risk factor.

“The development of the brain’s limbic system and amygdala continues after birth, through childhood and into adolescence. This is why these parts of the brain are more vulnerable than others to early negative emotional experiences.”

If powerful negative emotional experiences take place in early childhood, they affect the development of the brain’s neural networks.

“The development of emotional skills, such as social skills and interaction with others, may also be disrupted.”  

Basic research provides keys for prevention and treatment

Lauri’s research group is focusing on the amygdala and the ways in which stress experiences in early childhood mould the related neural networks.

“It appears that the stress effect is directed particularly at GABAergic neurotransmission, and especially one specific cell type,” Lauri explains.

GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) is one of the most common neurotransmitters in our brains.

“Early negative experiences are a risk factor for later symptoms.”

“It is important to explore how changes in the functioning of cells affect the development of neural networks in the long term, and how they guide our behaviour not only in childhood and youth but also adulthood. Even if the exposure to high stress takes place at an early stage, symptoms may not develop until after a long delay.”

Lauri believes that concerted basic research will lead to neuropsychiatric disorders, depression and anxiety among children and adolescents being treated more effectively – or even prevented – in the future.

“The research that is currently being conducted here and elsewhere will hopefully make it possible to manage symptoms in the future, and to treat them with new medicines that are more specifically targeted to nerve cells, in combination with therapy.”

Substantive leadership

Sari Lauri leads a team of seven researchers at the Neuroscience Centre of the University of Helsinki.

“For me, research optimally consists of gaining insight, finding new perspectives and learning. It is great to examine a hypothesis and test it to find out its validity. It always motivates me to go on,” she says.

Lauri says that the grant from the Cultural Foundation was received at an important point. It has helped to fund the work of visiting researchers, for example.

“My approach as a research director is fairly substantive and I want to ensure that my team members have the best possible working conditions. That allows us all to focus on essentials.”

The research group led by Sari Lauri received a EUR 39,000 grant from the Children’s Castle Foundation Fund for researching the neurobiological mechanisms of psychiatric syndromes related to early childhood stress.

Ukrainian families who have fled the war to Finland will be able to carry out creative and emotionally cathartic activities in nationwide operations coordinated by the Association of Finnish Children’s Cultural Centers, in which groups of children or families will meet weekly to try various forms of art. At the same time it will be an opportunity to create connections between Ukrainians and Finns.

Thanks to a grant from the Finnish Cultural Foundation totalling EUR 400,000, this initiative will reach refugee families around Finland until the summer of 2023. Children’s cultural centres around the country will run free art groups in various parts of the country, either in their own facilities or where the refugee families can be found, reception centres, for example. 

Weekly meetings in an artistic context provide a welcome break from everyday worries. There are fun activities for children amid various art forms. The weekly content will be adapted to the wishes and circumstances of the participating children and adults. “The activities will be different in each locality. Some families wish for exclusively Ukrainian groups, while others want to connect with Finnish families. The common denominator will be art,” explains the executive director of the Association of Finnish Children’s Cultural Centers, Aleksi Valta.

The project will make use of the experiences gained from group activities directed at Ukrainian families, run by the children’s cultural centres in the spring and summer of 2022. Cultural Centre PiiPoo in Lempäälä, for example, has offered directed and freeform playing, exercise, circus activities, painting, drawing, music and crafts. 

“Many Ukrainian refugee children have been engaged in target-oriented art activities in their homeland and miss it. One of the objectives of this project is to direct children who studied art in Ukraine to take art studies in Finland. Non-Ukrainians will be welcomed by any groups which have space,” says the Cultural Foundation’s secretary general, Antti Arjava.

For further information, please contact:

Secretary General Antti Arjava
Finnish Cultural Foundation
antti.arjava@skr.fi
tel. +358 50 385 7600

Executive Director Aleksi Valta
Association of Finnish Children’s Cultural Centers
aleksi.valta@lastenkulttuuri.fi
tel. +358 40 820 5425

Text: Essi Kähkönen
Photography: Petri Summanen

Statins are known to tens of thousands Finnish patients as cholesterol-lowering medicines. They especially reduce the amount of so-called bad cholesterol in the blood, helping many patients avoid coronary heart disease, heart failure and strokes.

Many are still cautious about taking cholesterol medication, because statins are reputed to have tricky side effects.

“Statins have been burdened with a somewhat undeserved image related to adverse effects, of which muscle and joint pain are perhaps the best known. Many patients who detect these effects stop taking statins without consulting their doctor,” says doctoral researcher, pharmacist Wilma Kiander from the Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Helsinki.

Kiander would like to remind people that statins are usually safe. A small proportion of users experience ill effects, however.

“Statins have been burdened with a somewhat undeserved image related to adverse effects, although they are usually safe.”

“Therefore it is important to figure out how the side effects of statins could be reduced,” she explains.

Some have a hereditary risk of adverse reactions

Kiander is researching the passage of statins through the body using specific carrier proteins, as well as how hereditary factors may influence this by impeding the functioning of these proteins. Carrier proteins ensure that the statins go from the circulation into the liver, through which they pass out of the body.

A small proportion of Finns have inherited a poorly functioning or even non-functioning version of a carrier protein. It is these protein variants that place this group of people at a higher risk of suffering adverse effects from statins.

According to Kiander, in persons with this kind of hereditary predisposition, the content of cholesterol medicines such as rosuvastatin and simvastatin in the blood may be as much as 60–200 per cent higher than that of other statin users.

“In this case the detrimental effects of the medication are also more likely to arise. The higher the statin content, the higher the risk of adverse side effects.”

Kiander says it is important to figure out the role of rare carrier protein variants in the success of statin treatments.

“It would allow doctors to be more cautious in prescribing statins.”

Many stories from the pharmacy counter

Kiander is a qualified pharmacist and in her work she has found that many patients who have been prescribed statins will hesitate before taking the medication. Similarly, many who have detected muscular or joint symptoms consider stopping the medication.

“Stopping the medication may carry higher risks than those of the mild muscle aches caused by the statin.”

“I have come across pharmacy customers who have tried several cholesterol medications without finding a suitable one. Often their level of commitment to taking the medication will be low, so they may stop taking it.”

However, Kiander says that stopping the medication may carry higher risks than those of the mild muscle aches caused by the statin.

“Remember that for many people statins are life-saving medicines.”

Personalised medical care is on the way

Once Wilma Kiander’s thesis is approved, it will join an important series of studies that aim to make medical care safer and more suitable for everyone.

Kiander hopes that in the future medications will be possible to tailor personally for each patient.

“Personalised medical care is already the norm in certain branches of medicine, but on a broader scale it is in its early stages. If we found a reliable and easy way to determine a person’s genotype and to check whether it includes factors that are adverse in terms of cholesterol medication, statins could also be prescribed more accurately,” says Kiander.

“Hopefully that would improve patients’ confidence in using these important drugs.”

Pharmacist Wilma Kiander received a two-year, EUR 52,000 grant from the Elli Turunen Fund in 2020 for her thesis research on the impact of heredity on the safety of cholesterol medication.

Text: Reeta Holma
Photos: JP Manninen

Patriotic songs are used in many established situations in Finland, without particularly exploring or questioning their use. Hearing the national anthem at a sporting event or a patriotic song at the President’s Independence Day celebrations may seem self-evident, but if listeners paused to consider their lyrics and origins, they might be surprised. 

Patriotic songs are a topic of interest for cultural anthropologist Aila Mustamo, who is writing a book on the subject. Mustamo is researching where patriotic songs have historically been sung and what they have meant for people at various stages and in diverse contexts.

She is exploring song traditions during the period between the Jaeger movement (1914), Finland’s independence (1917) and the Finnish Civil War (1918) up until the end of the Cold War and the Internet Age.

Mustamo is currently at the data collection stage; in the autumn of 2022 she will be gathering retrospective information and conducting interviews, which she hopes will provide more detailed information, especially on the attitudes of social minorities towards the music.

“Patriotic songs are an element of bourgeois tradition in Finland, but how did groups such as the blue-collar population relate to them,” Mustamo ponders? “Coming into the modern day, many ordinary Finns – not to mention people of immigrant origin – are fairly far removed from the cultural background of the songs.”

“Coming into the modern day, many ordinary Finns are fairly far removed from the cultural background of the songs.”

One of Mustamo’s sources of information are YouTube videos and their comments.

“The use of online data sources is fairly new in scientific research, and you have to come up with your own practices to some extent,” Mustamo says. She aims to be systematic in collecting and analysing data, which implies, for instance, seeking out and analysing all the existing versions of a specific song. On the other hand, new content is appearing all the time and their sources are never completely certain.

Ethical questions take on an important role. The researcher must consider questions such as whether direct quotations can be used. “I cannot ask thousands of internet users whether I can use their comments in my research. I strive to be considerate and to ensure that nobody can be identified based on the data, even if it is in the public domain.”

Finnish songs in the international context

“For many songs, the connection to their origins has been lost and new meanings are built in highly creative ways,” Mustamo says. Some Finnish songs can be adopted abroad; current examples can be found for example in Ukraine, which is under attack from Russia. The Ukrainians have made their own version of the Finnish WWII-era cuplé Niet Molotoff. “It has a similar level of black humour as the Finnish original, which indicates a very creative use of our cultural heritage,” Mustamo points out. A new patriotic song patrimony is also being created in Ukraine, an example being a popular song about the highly regarded Bayraktar drone.

Mustamo also mentions a YouTube video of a song about the Finnish Guards’ participation in the Russo-Turkish War. Its lyrics begin with a reference to cold and hunger during battles in the Balkan Mountains.

Few Finns will probably recognise the setting for the song, which is not mentioned very often in history books. In contrast, hundreds of Bulgarian commenters on the video can be found praising the Finns who took part in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877. “Finns, meanwhile, have no idea what it’s about,” Mustamo laughs. “In this way, elements of heritage that we consider purely Finnish are internationalised.”

Mustamo is excited to complete the retrospective data collection and interviews in order to start investigating the feelings evoked by patriotic songs outside of the internet. “It will be interesting to see how memories of patriotic songs have been provided with significance outside of the online world. There may be some surprises in store,” she says.

Aila Mustamo, PhD, received a EUR 32,000 grant from the Ulla and Eino Karosuo Fund in 2022 for her work researching and writing a book on Finnish patriotic songs.

Text: Essi Kähkönen
Photography: Kiri Halttunen

Depression is one of Finland’s biggest public health threats. Besides causing suffering and anguish for the persons affected and their friends and family, depression leads to thousands of people each year being disabled out of work.

From time to time, public discourse will wonder at the society’s inability to tackle depression and question whether Finland’s health care system has what it takes to help depression patients.

“Depression is probably not a single, cohesive illness but many different ones.”

“To some extent my doctoral thesis research, which looks at the neurological basis of depression, considers these same issues. Depression is probably not a single, cohesive illness but many different ones, and yet it is often treated as if its sufferers were a homogeneous group with similar symptoms,” says doctoral researcher Elina Kangas from the Department of Psychology at the University of Jyväskylä.

Wide range of symptoms

Let’s imagine we have two research subjects with depression. One has symptoms that could be described as affective and cognitive: lowered self-esteem, unreasonable feelings of guilt, urges to self-harm and difficulty focusing.

The other patient’s symptoms, in contrast, are mostly vegetative: frequent extreme tiredness, actions marked by agitation or, alternatively, sluggishness, and significant changes in appetite.

“What both patients share is the inability to feel pleasure in relation to almost anything, as well as a low, despondent mood.”

The factor that demands attention is the diversity, rather than the similarity of symptoms.

“There are no two identical depression patients or sets of symptoms. The potential symptoms are diverse and their weightings vary among patients,” Kangas explains.

What happens in a depressed person’s brain?

In her thesis research, Kangas is focusing on changes in early information processing faculties among depression sufferers. She is mostly doing this using electroencephalogram (EEG) readings.

Kangas is exploring the brain responses of depressed research subjects to things such as neutral aural and tactile stimuli, as well as to facial expressions denoting various emotions. She compares their results to a control group with no depression.

“These measurements provide valuable data on whether the early information processing faculties of depressed people differ from those of their non-depressed peers.”

“By early information processing I mean the stage of information processing that takes place automatically in our brains, before we become conscious of the stimulus,” Kangas explains.

“EEG allows us to measure electrical activity in the brain’s neurons to an accuracy level of a millisecond, and therefore these measurements provide valuable data on whether the early information processing faculties of depressed people differ from those of their non-depressed peers.”

Encounters with test subjects delayed by Covid

Kangas’s research setting of measuring differences in brain responses between depressed and non-depressed subjects suffered a setback right at the start, due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

“I have to carry out my research in a laboratory and it entails encounters between the researcher and subject. We had to avoid the risk of spreading Covid, so in the meantime I have focused on other aspects of my research. The outcomes of my brain response measurements are not yet ready for publication.”

There has been plenty to work on. Kangas feels it is important to figure out how the various symptom profiles and subtypes of depression could more accurately be classified.

“It would facilitate more individualistic treatment of depressive syndrome, making it possible to tailor medical care and therapy to the patient’s needs.”

Looking for depression biomarkers

According to Kangas, clinical interviews between doctor and patient will continue to be the most essential tool in diagnosing depression.

However, it would be useful to support these diagnoses by finding biomarkers that are typical of depression. A biomarker is any property that can reliably be used to measure and determine an individual’s state of health.

“Biomarkers for depression could be used for distinguishing more accurately between the various subtypes of the illness. Such biomarkers may in the future be found for instance in the brain responses I am researching,” Kangas says.

She emphasises the fact that a lot of basic research is still needed on depression as a many-sided syndrome.

“Basic research is what I am carrying out. The significance of this kind of fundamental work is that it can create a basis for applied research, for example on clinical depression biomarkers and individually tailored treatment models.”

Elina Kangas received a EUR 26,000 grant from the E. J. Längman Fund in 2022 for her doctoral research on the neurological basis of depression.

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Performers

Kateryna Kasper, soprano

The artist image of the Ukrainian soprano Kateryna Kasper is built on versatility and authenticity of interpretation. In 2014, she won first prize in the women’s category of the Mirjam Helin International Singing Competition and was signed to the Oper Frankfurt. Kasper’s international career includes operas and oratorios, as well as lied recitals.

Matija Meić, baritone

The charismatic Croatian baritone Matija Meić won second prize in the men’s category in the 2014 Mirjam Helin International Singing Competition, and he received a special prize for the best performance of a Finnish solo song by a non-Finnish singer. Meić was signed to the Gärtnerplatztheater in Munich in 2016. In addition to opera and oratorio performances, Meić gives frequent solo recitals.

Dmitry Ablogin, piano

Dmitry Ablogin is an innovative piano artist who has won many international competitions. In addition to performing, he teaches piano and fortepiano at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts.

Kirill Kozlovski, piano

The pianist Kirill Kozlovski (DMus) has performed as a solo recitalist and chamber musician at international festivals and as a soloist with Finnish symphony orchestras. He regularly performs alongside lied singers, and he teaches at the Sibelius Academy of the University of the Arts Helsinki.