Researcher studies grief over declining snow in Lapland

A University of Lapland researcher is studying how declining snowfall affects people’s emotions and what animal tracks in snow mean to them, Yle reports. Sanni Priha says changes in nature can cause environmental grief that may become a physical experience and prevent people from doing activities they enjoy.

The start of the snow season in Lapland has shifted as much as several weeks later because of climate change, and this autumn has followed the pattern, with October warmer than usual.

Priha says seasonal activities that once formed part of everyday life may no longer be possible. When she lived in Helsinki, she felt sad that she could not teach children to ski, go skating or pull a child to daycare on a sled.

Environmental grief is a sense of loss caused by changes to, or the threat of changes to, a landscape, ecosystem, species or way of life. Psychology doctoral researcher Juni Sinkkonen of the University of Eastern Finland has also studied the subject. Sinkkonen says feelings about nature, weather and the environment affect people’s wellbeing more than is generally acknowledged and can limit their ability to function.

Priha is now looking at animal tracks in snow and how people discuss them and interpret animal behaviour from them. She recalls that on an early visit to her mother-in-law near Savonlinna, people began conversations by sharing observations of snow tracks rather than asking how one another were doing. She is investigating whether a similar conversational culture exists in Lapland.

In earlier work, Priha explored the transformation and movement of snow through the seasons at Ritničohkka, a fell in Kilpisjärvi with Finland’s only perennial snow patch. She filmed a snow wall with a macro lens over several weeks, recording long sequences that she later sped up to show the snow’s gradual changes as it melted.

The snow patch has shrunk to about one-thousandth of its size in the 2010s. Priha’s research led to the film Farewell to Snow: The Snow Line, which presents events from snow’s perspective and uses an imagined voice for the snow. Jarkko Kela created the film’s sound design during post-production.