Mental Representations Constructed by Experts and Novices in Object-Oriented Program Comprehension

Burkhardt, Jean‐Marie; Détienne, Françoise; Wiedenbeck, Susan

doi:10.1007/978-0-387-35175-9_55

Cited by 31 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…The finding of differences in the mental representation of imperative and 00 programs in this study makes further study of such questions interesting. Work on the mental representation of 00 programs by experts is in progress (Burkhardt et al, 1997).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This questions of the role of objects and other 00 features in the mental representation merits further study. Preliminary results from a study of 00 experts (Burkhardt et al, 1997), suggest that classes and the relationship of classes form an important part of their mental representations. The role of other 00 features in mental representations is also is of interest and may be studied for experts or advanced novices in more complex pro--s.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…To date, it appears that studies of 00 programming have concentrated primarily on program design, and secondarily on reuse and maintenance. We are aware of only one study which focuses directly on comprehension in the 00 style (Burkhardt, DCtienne, and Wiedenbeck, 1997). Furthermore, most previous studies involve either 00 experts or else experienced programmers learning to program in the 00 style after substantial student or professional experience in the imperative style.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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An empirical study of novice program comprehension in the imperative and object-oriented styles

Ramalingam

Wiedenbeck

1997

Papers Presented at the Seventh Workshop on Empirical Studies of Programmers - ESP '97

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The objective of this study was to determine whether the mental representation of object-oriented programs differs from imperative programs for novice programmers. In our study novices who had little or no previous programming experience studied and answered questions about three imperative and three object-oriented programs. The questions targeted information categories making up the program model and the domain model representations of the programs. It was found that there was a sharp contrast between the mental representations of the imperative and object-oriented programs. While the comprehension of the imperative programs was better overall than that of the object-oriented programs, the mental representations of the imperative programs focused on program-level knowledge. On the other hand, the mental representations of the objectoriented programs focused more strongly on domain-level knowledge. The results tend to support the view that language notations differ in how well they support the extraction of various kinds of information.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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An empirical study of novice program comprehension in the imperative and object-oriented styles

Ramalingam

Wiedenbeck

1997

Papers Presented at the Seventh Workshop on Empirical Studies of Programmers - ESP '97

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“…As regard OO program comprehension, we note that some studies are in progress (Burkhardt, Détienne & Wiedenbeck, 1997). Also, we regret that there are, as far as we know, almost no empirical studies on real novices.…”

Section: Limitations and Directions For Future Workmentioning

confidence: 91%

Assessing the cognitive consequences of the object-oriented approach: A survey of empirical research on object-oriented design by individuals and teams

Détienne¹

1997

Interacting with Computers

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This paper presents a state-of-art review of empirical research on object-oriented (OO) design. Many claims about the cognitive benefits of the OO paradigm have been made by its advocates. These claims concern the ease of designing and reusing software at the individual level as well as the benefits of this paradigm at the team level. Since these claims are cognitive in nature, its seems important to assess them empirically. After a brief presentation of the main concepts of the OO paradigm, the claims about the superiority of OO design are outlined. Computers, 1997, 9, p 47-72 http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/525445/description#description 2 The core of this paper consists of a review of empirical studies of OOD. We first discuss results concerning OOD by individuals. On the basis of empirical work, we (1) analyse the design activity of novice OO designers, (2) compare OO design with procedural design and, (3) discuss a typology of problems relevant for the OO approach. Then we assess the claims about naturalness and ease of OO design. Published in Interacting withThe next part discusses results on OO software reuse. On the basis of empirical work, we (1) compare reuse in the OO versus procedural paradigm, (2) discuss the potential for OO software reuse and (3) analyse reuse activity in the OO paradigm. Then we assess claims on reusability.The final part reviews empirical work on OO design by teams. We present results on communication, coordination, knowledge dissemination and interactions with clients. Then we assess claims about OOD at the software design team level.In a general conclusion, we discuss the limitations of these studies and give some directions for future research. Computers, 1997, 9, p 47-72 Interactions with clients 6.4 Published in Interacting withAssessing claims about OOD in design teams Limitations and directions for future work ReferencesPublished in Interacting with Computers, 1997, 9, p 47-72 IntroductionThis paper presents a state-of-art review of empirical research on object-oriented (OO) design. OO technology has been accepted by both academia and industry in a very short time. Ten years ago, the few OO languages available were seen as interesting ideas. Since then, new languages have been designed and existing languages have been extended to become object-oriented. Many claims about the cognitive benefits of the OO paradigm have been made by its advocates. These claims concern the ease of designing and reusing software at the individual level as well as the benefits of this paradigm at the team level. Given the rapid acceptance of this new technology, it is imperative to understand the process and to evaluate the benefits of OO design. Since these claims are cognitive in nature, its seems important to assess them empirically (Détienne & Rist, 1995).Since 1990, much empirical work has been conducted on OO design both at the individual level and at the software design team level. These studies are field studies and laboratory studies. Th...

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“…Burkhardt et al (Burkhardt, Detienne, and Wiedenbeck, 1997) applied this three level model to object-oriented software. For the situation model they make a distinction between a static part and a dynamic part.…”

Section: A Cognitive Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Object-Oriented Metrics: A Review of Theory and Practice

El-Emam¹

2002

Advances in Software Engineering

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Mental Representations Constructed by Experts and Novices in Object-Oriented Program Comprehension

Cited by 31 publications

References 14 publications

An empirical study of novice program comprehension in the imperative and object-oriented styles

An empirical study of novice program comprehension in the imperative and object-oriented styles

Assessing the cognitive consequences of the object-oriented approach: A survey of empirical research on object-oriented design by individuals and teams

Object-Oriented Metrics: A Review of Theory and Practice

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