Presenting software engineering results using stru

Authors: David Budgen Barbara A Kitchenham Stuart M Charters Mark Turner Pearl Brereton Stephen G Linkman

Publish Date: 2008/07/17

Volume: 13, Issue: 4, Pages: 435-468

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Abstract

When conducting a systematic literature review researchers usually determine the relevance of primary studies on the basis of the title and abstract However experience indicates that the abstracts for many software engineering papers are of too poor a quality to be used for this purpose A solution adopted in other domains is to employ structured abstracts to improve the quality of information provided This study consists of a formal experiment to investigate whether structured abstracts are more complete and easier to understand than nonstructured abstracts for papers that describe software engineering experiments We constructed structured versions of the abstracts for a random selection of 25 papers describing software engineering experiments The 64 participants were each presented with one abstract in its original unstructured form and one in a structured form and for each one were asked to assess its clarity measured on a scale of 1 to 10 and completeness measured with a questionnaire that used 18 items Based on a regression analysis that adjusted for participant abstract type of abstract seen first knowledge of structured abstracts software engineering role and preference for conventional or structured abstracts the use of structured abstracts increased the completeness score by 665 SE 037 p  0001 and the clarity score by 298 SE 023 p  0001 57 participants reported their preferences regarding structured abstracts 13 23 had no preference 40 70 preferred structured abstracts four preferred conventional abstracts Many conventional software engineering abstracts omit important information Our study is consistent with studies from other disciplines and confirms that structured abstracts can improve both information content and readability Although care must be taken to develop appropriate structures for different types of article we recommend that Software Engineering journals and conferences adopt structured abstractsThis work was supported by an award from the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council EPSRC The authors would also like to thank Dag Sjøberg for providing a random selection of papers to use in this study all those who helped by participating in the study as ‘judges’ John Bailey who organised the data collection and Professor Jim Hartley of Keele University for his advice and guidanceThe process to be followed was made as prescriptive as possible so that all of the editors were following the same procedures A full description is provided in the study protocol here we give the basic outlines and describe some of the conventions employedFirst complete a paper copy of the evaluation form Then rewrite the material from the existing abstract into a structured form as completely as possible Keep a copy of this initial rewrite for later use in counting words under different headings Each heading should begin on a new line but please do not use white space between headings the abstract should be a continuous sequence of textIf the original authors respond with suggested changes the abstract may need to be further revised Note that only material available in the original paper should be included and a record should be kept of what is done about each of the suggested changes

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