Ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering

Software engineering code of ethics and professional practice l l p i i short version i i tedi followi i l i application i professional page 1 of 9 2222004 the time is right to get serious about this. This is reinforced by the fact that most engineering ethics textbooks focus primarily on ethical issues faced by civil, mechanical or elecrical engineers. Discussion of ethics and ethical issues in software engineering is important. The purpose of this course is to develop a solid foundation for reasoning about ethical, professional, and social issues that arise in the engineering professions. Social and ethical issues in engineering, ethical principles of engineering, professional code of ethics, some specific social problems in engineering practice. The popularity of empirical methods in software engineering research is on the rise. State of the art in engineering ethics methodologies for case. Nonetheless their views may be important for a number of reasons. This task fits within our own empirical bioethics perspective.

Selecting a research method for empirical software engineering research is. Issues in using students in empirical studies in software. Professional and ethical dilemmas in software engineering. Pdf ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering. In contrast, the ethical issues raised by empirical methods have received little, if any, attention in the software engineering literature. Ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering citeseerx. The engineering ethics cases in this series were written by santa clara university school of engineering students clare bartlett, nabilah deen, and jocelyn tan, who worked as hackworth engineering ethics fellows at the markkula center for applied ethics over the course of the 20142015 academic year. Ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering is the property of its rightful owner. Software engineering is a relatively young practice and compared with other engineering disciplines, its culture of professionalism is still developing. Petroski notes that most engineering failures are much more involved than simple technical miscalculations and involve the failure of the design process or management culture.

I try to publish data, software, analysis scripts, and paper preprints whenever possible. Eg 44175 is the an elective course provided by the computer science and engineering program at the university of notre dame. The increased application of empirical methods has also brought about an increase in discussions about adapting these methods to the peculiarities of software engineering. Is it ethical to log users actions in software engineering experiments. Computer communication does not methods and tools of analysis of ethical. There has been a lot of research on personality and its impact on software engineering practice.

Surveys, experiments, metrics, case studies, and field studies are examples of empirical methods used to investigate both software engineering processes and products. A survey of current practice, empirical software engineering, volume 6, issue 4, dec 2001. Pdf ethics and empirical studies of software engineering. As software becomes increasingly dominant in the it industry, and, indeed, in everything else, there is an obvious need for a professional. These cases have been fictionalized to help direct the discussion toward the ethical concerns in the practice of software engineering. Issues in using students in empirical studies in software engineering education jeffrey carver1, letizia jaccheri2, sandro morasca3, and forrest shull4 1 experimental software engineering group, dept. Apr 26, 2015 following are some of the research articles that can provide students with a good understanding of the key areas of empirical research methods for software engineering. Use of personality tests in empirical software engineering. Engineering ethical challenges college of engineering. Votta electrical and computer engineering computer science motorola university of texas at austin university of maryland 1501 w. Ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering ieee.

Pdf professional and ethical issues of software engineering. We discuss how the immaturity of the software engineering discipline is reflected in an approach to ethical issues that compares unfavourably with other more mature disciplines. The panel will discuss ethical considerations that arise in the practice of software engineering and will use the cases below to help focus the discussion. In this paper we explore how the software engineering research community is currently dealing with the ethical issues that some empirical research presents. Donald gotterbarn, ethics in qualitative studies of commercial software enterprises ethical analysis, empirical software engineering, volume 6, issue 4, dec 2001, pages 301 304 tracy hall, valerie flynn, ethical issues in software engineering research. Jonas is a professor at a wellknown university in the.

Reaching out to professional software developers is a crucial part of empirical software engineering research. Issues in sampling software developers empiricalsoftware. Orrs fascinating ethnography of the working lives of photocopier technicians notwithstanding, studies that probe the views and opinions of the engineering community are a relatively slim volume in academic literature, particularly studies of ethical issues 23,24,25. Ethics and empirical studies of software engineering. Surveys, experiments, metrics, case studies, and field studies are exa. It was reasonable to assume that ethical issues and the way engineers deal with them depend on characteristics of the design process. One important method to investigate the state of practice is survey resea. Mar 21, 2009 ethical issues in software engineering. This article is intended to introduce the ethical issues raised by empirical research to the software engineering research community, and to stimulate discussion of how best to deal with these ethical issues. Surveys, experiments, metrics, case studies, and field studies are examples. The personal software process psp has during the last couple of years gained attention as a way to individual improvements in software development. This article is intended to introduce the ethical issues raised by empirical research to the software engineering research community and to stimulate discussion of how best to deal with these ethical issues.

A recent taxonomy of the papers published in the journal empirical software engineering over the period 19972003 indicates that research in this field is dominated by quantitative studies that test hypotheses by means of laboratory experiments, using experimental and. Ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering abstract. Austin, tx 78712 college park, md 20742 arlington heights, il 60004. Emerging technologies and ethical issues in engineering. The main objective of traditional empirical ethics focuses on biomedical research, but many issues raised in research ethics may also arise in empirical ethical studies themselves. Moreover, the community has yet to produce or adopt a common set of guidelines geared towards the ethical issues faced by empirical software engineering researchers 18.

Researchers conducting empirical studies of software engineering esse often face such ethical dilemmas. The authors identify, categorize, and name nine specific ethical and professional dilemmas in software engineering, placing them in the context of the ieee code of conduct, with the hope that giving such behavior a name will increase awareness and decrease the frequency with which these dilemmas occur. I believe that in empirical software engineering, we have not yet. Index termsethics, empirical studies, software engineering, legal issues. These studies use different psychological tests to identify personality types of software practition.

Software engineering code of ethics and professional practice. Quasiexperiments may be used, for example, when, for ethical reasons, subjects. This article is intended to introduce the ethical issues raised by empirical research to the software engineering research community. Ethical issues in empirical studies of software engineering. Engineering ethics cases markkula center for applied ethics. The author is aware of the ethical issues that might arise with this. Any empirical research activity involving human subjects.

Empirical research methods in software engineering. Selecting empirical methods for software engineering research. Pdf the popularity of empirical methods in software engineering research is on the rise. Earlier involvement and better articulation of ethical concerns may also facilitate innovation, and avert problems that can arise when the assumptions of management and of implementation teams are not aligned. Pdf ethical issues in empirical studies of software. We show that an analysis of recent published work measures an. However, not all engineering failures involve ethical issues. Ethical issues in software engineering meherchilakalapudi. Based on our experience, we also offer concrete advice for carrying out empirical stud. Jabar, 3 fatimah sidi, 4 koh tieng wei 1,2,4department of software engineering and information system 3department of computer science faculty of computer science and information technology universiti putra malaysia.

The psp is introduced to students and engineers through a course, which introduces a personal. If so, share your ppt presentation slides online with. Empirical studies in software engineering can involve a variety of organizations, each with their own set of policies and procedures geared at safeguarding. Surveys, experiments, metrics, case studies, and field studies are examples of empirical methods used to.

As responsible human beings and as professionals, we need to use the knowledge and skills for the benefit of the society. With the influence of computers on all walks of life and the role of software in all the systems, software professionals have the power to do good or bad to the society. State of the art in engineering ethics methodologies for case studies in engineering ethics. Abstractthe popularity of empirical methods in software engineering research is on the rise. Yet, to date, little has been written about ethics as it applies to esse. Ethnographicallyinformed empirical studies of software. Jonas is a professor at a wellknown university in the newly created software engineering program. These issues are illustrated with real empirical studies of software engineering. This article is intended to introduce the ethical issues raised by empirical research to the software engineering research community, and to stimulate. Empirical studies in software engineering can involve a variety of organizations, each with their own set of policies and procedures geared at safeguarding the interests and responsibilities of the researchers, students, the collaborating company, the university, and possibly national funding agencies like the national science foundation and the national institute of health. Qualitative studies of software practice appear to be unusual in empirical software engineering research. Research methods for software engineering students news.