Simone Kriglstein is an associate professor at Masaryk University, as well as a scientist at the Austrian Institute of Technology. She specializes in designing and evaluating user interfaces and interaction methods in different fields, including games. Her work has been published in international conference proceedings such as the Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems and journals like Computer & Graphics and Computers in Human Behavior.
Bullying Is NOT a Game – But Games Can Help Preventing It
FROG 2022 – Keynote
Unfortunately, many young people in today’s world are exposed to bullying, posing serious social problem at schools worldwide. Especially around the age of 11 to 12, when children try out different things and search for their identity, bullying arises very often from the fear of the unknown, e.g., the different thinking, looks, or backgrounds. Many of those who are affected have to deal with it on a daily basis with studies already confirming the negative impact of bullying on the psychological and academic development of young people. With the rise of the Internet bullying also shifted from the physical space towards a virtual one. In the past, bullying often took place in classrooms where teachers had the opportunity to intervene and find solutions. Nowadays, however, young people frequently use smartphones and social media which offer an increased degree of anonymity which, in turn, can contribute to bullying and cyberbullying. Therefore, prevention strategies as early as possible — such as workshops in schools – are essential to make children more sensitive to this topic. However, many initiatives against bullying in schools often only focus on theoretical facts. This talk will explore the question how can we give a more playful touch to such prevention efforts to make them more engaging to a young audience, for example, via serious games.
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