Finland has aimed to make itself an international leader in genomic research and related business and, in working towards that goal, has enacted biobank legislation. The Biobank Act requires biobanks to gain approval, be supervised, and register at the national level. Numerous other laws may also apply in any given research setting, such as the Personal Data Act, the Medical Research Act, and the Act on Medical Use of Human Organs and Tissues. In terms of privacy protection, anonymization is generally (...) not permitted under Finnish law and therefore most biobanks pseudonomize data and samples. However, the broad understanding of what is identifiable data in Finland has created difficulties in sharing with non-EU countries. Furthermore, consent to biobank research is only applicable to the sample and related data, not to data stored in other health-related registries, and consent is only to the field of research for that particular biobank. These restrictions impede the sharing of samples and data for research. (shrink)

Notions of care for humans and more-than-humans appear at the margins of the sustainability transformations debate. This paper explores the merits of an ethics of care approach to sustainability tr...

Contributed articles on feminist theory of gender identity in India.

Having the ability to understand emotionally how other people feel and see things is an essential fabric for building and sustaining functional interpersonal relationships. Without such an ability, social interaction crumbles, engagement fails, and learning is eroded. Yet, empirical evidence on the relationship between study burnout and study engagement, and empathy between upper secondary school students is limited. We are tackling the challenge by exploring the association between empathy between peers and study engagement and study burnout among upper secondary school (...) students. Two hundred and eighty upper secondary education students took part in our cross-sectional study. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the association between empathy, and study burnout and study engagement. The results showed that cognitive empathy contributed to affective empathy, which was further related to increased levels of study engagement, and decreased levels of cynicism, and sense of inadequacy. The role of cognitive empathy seemed to be more complicated: while cognitive empathy contributed directly to increased levels of cynicism, and inadequacy and decrease in study engagement, the indirect effects of cognitive empathy on cynicism and inadequacy were negative, and positive on study engagement. Neither of the empathy dimensions explained students’ emotional exhaustion. The results indicate that merely teaching students to recognize and identify their peers’ emotions is not sufficient to enhance study wellbeing, but they need to learn to share emotions and to tune into each other’s emotions. (shrink)