论文标题
软件工程研究中的社会科学理论
Social Science Theories in Software Engineering Research
论文作者
论文摘要
随着软件工程研究越来越关注软件开发的心理，社会学和管理方面，参考学科的相关理论对于理解该领域感兴趣的核心现象越来越重要。但是，软件工程研究借鉴相关社会科学的程度尚不清楚。因此，这项研究调查了13年来五个有影响力的软件工程期刊中对社会科学理论的使用。它不仅分析了理论使用的程度，还分析了使用这些理论的方式，方式和何处。尽管使用了87种不同的理论，但不到2％的论文使用社会科学理论，大多数理论仅在一篇论文中使用，大多数社会科学都被忽略了，并且很少对理论用于适用于软件工程环境。忽略相关的社会科学理论可能会（1）破坏社区产生，详细和维护累积知识体系的能力； （2）导致软件工程现象的简化模型。对于软件工程作为科学学科而成熟的理论需要更多地关注理论。
As software engineering research becomes more concerned with the psychological, sociological and managerial aspects of software development, relevant theories from reference disciplines are increasingly important for understanding the field's core phenomena of interest. However, the degree to which software engineering research draws on relevant social sciences remains unclear. This study therefore investigates the use of social science theories in five influential software engineering journals over 13 years. It analyzes not only the extent of theory use but also what, how and where these theories are used. While 87 different theories are used, less than two percent of papers use a social science theory, most theories are used in only one paper, most social sciences are ignored, and the theories are rarely tested for applicability to software engineering contexts. Ignoring relevant social science theories may (1) undermine the community's ability to generate, elaborate and maintain a cumulative body of knowledge; and (2) lead to oversimplified models of software engineering phenomena. More attention to theory is needed for software engineering to mature as a scientific discipline.
