Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Using Students as Subjects – A Comparative Study of Students and Professionals in Lead-Time Impact Assessment

Höst, Martin LU ; Regnell, Björn LU orcid and Wohlin, Claes LU (2000) In Empirical Software Engineering 5(3). p.201-214
Abstract
In many studiesin software engineering students are used instead of professionalsoftware developers, although the objective is to draw conclusionsvalid for professional software developers. This paper presentsa study where the difference between the two groups is evaluated.People from the two groups have individually carried out a non-trivialsoftware engineering judgement task involving the assessmentof how ten different factors affect the lead-time of softwaredevelopment projects. It is found that the differences are onlyminor, and it is concluded that software engineering studentsmay be used instead of professional software developers undercertain conditions. These conditions are identified and describedbased on generally accepted... (More)
In many studiesin software engineering students are used instead of professionalsoftware developers, although the objective is to draw conclusionsvalid for professional software developers. This paper presentsa study where the difference between the two groups is evaluated.People from the two groups have individually carried out a non-trivialsoftware engineering judgement task involving the assessmentof how ten different factors affect the lead-time of softwaredevelopment projects. It is found that the differences are onlyminor, and it is concluded that software engineering studentsmay be used instead of professional software developers undercertain conditions. These conditions are identified and describedbased on generally accepted criteria for validity evaluationof empirical studies. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Empirical Software Engineering
volume
5
issue
3
pages
201 - 214
publisher
Springer
external identifiers
  • scopus:0034315094
ISSN
1573-7616
DOI
10.1023/A:1026586415054
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
0be6b639-65b7-43eb-b308-f49e14308c40 (old id 766312)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 11:52:41
date last changed
2022-03-20 20:11:55
@article{0be6b639-65b7-43eb-b308-f49e14308c40,
  abstract     = {{In many studiesin software engineering students are used instead of professionalsoftware developers, although the objective is to draw conclusionsvalid for professional software developers. This paper presentsa study where the difference between the two groups is evaluated.People from the two groups have individually carried out a non-trivialsoftware engineering judgement task involving the assessmentof how ten different factors affect the lead-time of softwaredevelopment projects. It is found that the differences are onlyminor, and it is concluded that software engineering studentsmay be used instead of professional software developers undercertain conditions. These conditions are identified and describedbased on generally accepted criteria for validity evaluationof empirical studies.}},
  author       = {{Höst, Martin and Regnell, Björn and Wohlin, Claes}},
  issn         = {{1573-7616}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{3}},
  pages        = {{201--214}},
  publisher    = {{Springer}},
  series       = {{Empirical Software Engineering}},
  title        = {{Using Students as Subjects – A Comparative Study of Students and Professionals in Lead-Time Impact Assessment}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A:1026586415054}},
  doi          = {{10.1023/A:1026586415054}},
  volume       = {{5}},
  year         = {{2000}},
}