CNN Article: When Bullying goes High Tech

[believe09]

LINK HERE

I think this article is a must read for parents and children, to be honest. There is a tremendous amount of information but what I found most intriguing was this:

Scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology are working on an even more automated solution. They want to set up a system that would give bullying victims coping strategies, encourage potential bullies to stop and think before posting something offensive, and allow onlookers to defend victims, said Henry Lieberman.
Lieberman's students Birago Jones and Karthik Dinakar are working on an algorithm that would automatically detect bullying language. The research group has broken down the sorts of offensive statements that commonly get made, grouping them into categories such as racial/ethnic slurs, intelligence insults, sexuality accusations and social acceptance/rejection.

The student in Lieberman's class are looking at words being used in relationship with specific genders as well. The example in the article is "You look good in lipstick" possibly being posted on the wall of a male facebook user.