Abstract
Pair programming consists of two developers who collaborate with each other on the same programming task to design and code a solution. Previous pair programming experiments did not explore the efficacy of pairs in program design separately from coding, and most suffered from using students who were not full-time, professional programmers. Aptitude tests relevant to program design tasks have been shown to correlate with future programming performance and do not require skill in a particular computer language. Variations in programmer skill in a particular language or integrated development environment can interfere with interpreting results in pair programming experiments and mask the skill of subjects in program design related tasks. Two experiments were conducted with full-time professional programmers as subjects who worked on increasingly complex aptitude tasks related to problem solving and algorithmic design. In both experiments, pairs significantly outperformed solos, providing evidence of the value of pairs in program design related tasks.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 197-211 |
| Number of pages | 15 |
| Journal | IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Mar 2008 |
Keywords
- Group dynamics
- Pair programming
- Programming aptitude test
- Programming experiment
- Software design
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Software