Established contributors are the backbone of many free/libre open source software (FLOSS) projects. Previous research has shown that it is critically important for projects to retain contributors and it has also revealed the motivations behind why contributors choose to participate in FLOSS in the first place. However, there has been limited research done on the reasons why established contributors disengage, and factors (on an individual and project level) that predict their disengagement. In this paper, we conduct a mixed-methods empirical study, combining surveys and survival modeling, to identify the reasons and predictive factors behind established contributor disengagement. We find that different groups of established contributors tend to disengage for different reasons; however, overall contributors most commonly cite some kind of transition (e.g., switching jobs or leaving academia). We also find that factors such as the popularity of the projects a contributor works on, whether they have experienced a transition, when they work, and how much they work are all factors that can be used to predict their disengagement from open source.
The mass shift to working at home during the COVID-19 pandemic radically changed the way many software development teams collaborate and communicate. To investigate how team culture and team productivity may also have been affected, we conducted two surveys at a large software company. The first, an exploratory survey during the early months of the pandemic with 2,265 developer responses, revealed that many developers faced challenges reaching milestones and that their team productivity had changed. We also found through qualitative analysis that important team culture factors such as communication and social connection had been affected. For example, the simple phrase "How was your weekend?" had become a subtle way to show peer support.In our second survey, we conducted a quantitative analysis of the team cultural factors that emerged from our first survey to understand the prevalence of the reported changes. From 608 developer responses, we found that 74% of these respondents missed social interactions with colleagues and 51% reported a decrease in their communication ease with colleagues. We used data from the second survey to build a regression model to identify important team culture factors for modeling team productivity. We found that the ability to brainstorm with colleagues, difficulty communicating with colleagues, and satisfaction with interactions from social activities are important factors that are associated with how developers report their software development team's productivity. Our findings inform how managers and leaders in large software companies can support sustained team productivity during times of crisis and beyond.
This study determined if a SystemCHANGE™ intervention was more efficacious than attention control in increasing immunosuppressive medication adherence and improving outcomes in adult kidney transplant recipients during a 6-month intervention phase and subsequent 6-month (no intervention) maintenance phase. The SystemCHANGE™ intervention taught patients to use person-level quality improvement strategies to link adherence to established daily routines, environmental cues, and supportive people. Eighty-nine patients (average age 51.8 years, 58% male, 61% African American) completed the 6-month intervention phase. Using an intent-to-treat analysis, at 6 months, medication adherence for SystemCHANGE™ (median 0.91, IQR 0.76-0.96) and attention control (median 0.67, IQR 0.52-0.72) patients differed markedly (difference in medians 0.24, 95% CI 0.13-0.30, P < .001). At the conclusion of the subsequent 6-month maintenance phase, the gap between medication adherence for SystemCHANGE™ (median 0.77, IQR 0.56-0.94) and attention control (median 0.60, IQR 0.44-0.73) patients remained large (difference in medians 0.17, 95% CI 0.06-0.33, P = .004). SystemCHANGE™ patients evidenced lower mean creatinine and BUN at 12 months and more infections at 6 and 12 months. This first fully powered RCT testing SystemCHANGE™ to improve and maintain medication adherence in
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