Incorporating human error education into software engineering courses via error-based inspections

Vaibhav Anu, Gursimran Walia, Gary Bradshaw

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

9 Scopus citations

Abstract

In spite of the human-centric aspect of software engineering (SE) discipline, human error knowledge has been ignored by SE educators as it is often thought of as something that belongs in the realm of Psychology. SE curriculum is also severely devoid of educational content on human errors, while other human-centric disciplines (aviation, medicine, process control) have developed human error training and other interventions. To evaluate the feasibility of using such interventions to teach students about human errors in SE, this paper describes an exploratory study to evaluate whether requirements inspections driven by human errors can be used to deliver both requirements validation knowledge (a key industry skill) and human error knowledge to students. The results suggest that human error based inspections can enhance the fault detection abilities of students, a primary learning outcome of inspection exercises conducted in software engineering courses. Additionally, results showed that students found human error information useful for understanding the underlying causes of requirement faults.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationSIGCSE 2017 - Proceedings of the 2017 ACM SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education
PublisherAssociation for Computing Machinery
Pages39-44
Number of pages6
ISBN (Electronic)9781450346986
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 8 2017
Externally publishedYes
Event48th ACM SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education, SIGCSE 2017 - Seattle, United States
Duration: Mar 8 2017Mar 11 2017

Publication series

NameProceedings of the Conference on Integrating Technology into Computer Science Education, ITiCSE

Conference

Conference48th ACM SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education, SIGCSE 2017
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySeattle
Period3/8/173/11/17

Keywords

  • Human error
  • Psychology
  • Requirements inspection
  • Taxonomy

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Education
  • Computer Science Applications

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