Related papers: The Price of Using Students
Should students be used as experimental subjects in software engineering? Given that students are in many cases readily available and cheap it is no surprise that the vast majority of controlled experiments in software engineering use them.…
Most Software Engineering (SE) human-based controlled experiments rely on students as participants, raising concerns about their external validity. Specifically, the realism of results obtained from students and their applicability to the…
Empirical research in reverse engineering and software protection is crucial for evaluating the efficacy of methods designed to protect software against unauthorized access and tampering. However, conducting such studies with professional…
Testing is an indispensable part of software development. However, a career in software testing is reported to be unpopular among students in computer science and related areas. This can potentially create a shortage of testers in the…
Background: Despite the potential benefits of software modelling, developers have shown a considerable reluctance towards its application. There is substantial existing research studying industrial use and technical challenges of modelling.…
I welcome the contribution from Falessi et al. [1] hereafter referred to as F++ , and the ensuing debate. Experimentation is an important tool within empirical software engineering, so how we select participants is clearly a relevant…
Context. Recently, a family of studies highlighted the unpopularity of software testing careers among undergraduate students in software engineering and computer science courses. The original study and its replications explored the…
[Context] In software engineering research, emphasis is given to sound evaluations of new approaches. While industry surveys or industrial case studies are preferred to evaluate industrial applicability, controlled experiments with student…
Software testing is vital to improve software quality. However, software tester role is stigmatized, partly due to misperception and partly due to the treatment of the testing process within the software industry. The present study analyses…
Software is at the core of most scientific discoveries today. Therefore, the quality of research results highly depends on the quality of the research software. Rigorous testing, as we know it from software engineering in the industry,…
Context: Using student subjects in empirical studies has been discussed extensively from a methodological perspective in Software Engineering (SE), but there is a lack of similar discussion surrounding ethical aspects of doing so. As…
Background: Software modelling is a creative yet challenging task. Modellers often find themselves lost in the process, from understanding the modelling problem to solving it with proper modelling strategies and modelling tools. Students…
As software systems are becoming more pervasive, they are also becoming more susceptible to failures, resulting in potentially lethal combinations. Software test-ing is critical to preventing software failures but is, arguably, the least…
Students enrolled in software engineering degrees are generally required to undertake a research project in their final year through which they demonstrate the ability to conduct research, communicate outcomes, and build in-depth expertise…
Creativity is a critical skill that professional software engineers leverage to tackle difficult problems. In higher education, multiple efforts have been made to spark creative skills of engineering students. However, creativity is a vague…
Understanding how individuals make decisions involving risk is a fundamental aspect of behavioral research. Despite the ubiquity of risk in various aspects of life, limited empirical work has explored student risk-taking behavior in…
User studies are paramount for advancing science. However, researchers face several barriers when performing them despite the existence of supporting tools. In this work, we study how existing tools and their features cope with previously…
CONTEXT: There is growing interest in establishing software engineering as an evidence-based discipline. To that end, replication is often used to gain confidence in empirical findings, as opposed to reproduction where the goal is showing…
Software testing is one of the crucial supporting processes of software life cycle. Unfortunately for the software industry, the role is stigmatized, partly due to misperception and partly due to treatment of the role in the software…
Popularity of the use of free software in the IT industry is much higher than its popular use in educational activities. Disadvantages of free software and problems of its implementation in the educational process is a limiting factor for…