BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE FESTIVAL:IF YOU think your cheeky unsigned texts and e-mails hide your identity, think again. The new science of "forensic linguistics" might expose you.
It reveals clues hidden in the way users form words and express yourself over these electronic media. It assisted in the conviction last February of a murderer in a case where the victim's body was never recovered.
Forensic linguistics will be discussed today at the annual British Association for the Advancement of Science's annual Festival of Sciencein Liverpool.
The five-day festival will include contributions from more than 350 scientists from around the world in diverse fields from physics and forensics to economics and sociology. They will present their work to the general public who benefit from learning about the latest discoveries in research but delivered in non-scientific language.
The association's president, Sir David King, said during his opening address at the festival that scientists should consider redirecting their talents towards solving international problems .
"It is really astonishing that we are better able to land a spacecraft on Mars, that we are better able to understand the function and properties of the Higgs boson, than we are able to deal with millions of deaths each year from HIV-Aids and malaria and poor nutrition; or developing renewable CO2-free energy sources for all our economies," he stated.
He identified a number of challenges that needed urgent action, especially the food crisis. He criticised genetically modified food and the West's move towards organic farming and against agricultural technology in general.
Sir David highlighted climate change and energy and attacked the view that free market economies would provide answers to world problems. "The Earth's atmosphere is shared by all nations. Managing it demands a massive collective response which cannot be delivered by an unfettered free market system," he said.
Forensic linguistics will be discussed today in a presentation called: Txt Crimes, Sex Crimes and Murder: the Science of Forensic Linguistics. It is based on research by Dr Tim Grant, deputy director of the Centre for Forensic Linguistics at Aston University.
Language analysis is becoming an increasingly important part of police investigations, he believes. It allows a connection to be made between incriminating documents, e-mails or texts and the person who wrote them.
Typical uses might be to analyse an anonymous threatening note, identify the author of documents linked to a terrorist plot or the words exchanged in apparent anonymity in chat room or e-mail conversations. He acknowledges concerns that such work might contribute to the notion of a "surveillance society", but the ability to identify a perpetrator "can only be beneficial for society", he argues.
Forensic linguistics helped to convict David Hodgson last February for the murder of his ex-lover Jenny Nicholl.
She disappeared in June 2005 and as part of the investigation police examined texts apparently sent from her mobile phone. However, close analysis showed differences in word usage and text shorthand.
Certain stylistic points in texts known to have come from Nicholl were absent in these texts, but closely matched those used by Hodgson.
While not conclusive, these inconsistencies added to the weight of evidence against Hodgson, helping to lead to his conviction.
The Irish Timeswill carry daily reports from the festival.
