Diane S. Rohlman
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Publications by Diane S. Rohlman (bibliography)
» 1994 «
Leventhal, Laura Marie, Teasley, Barbee Eve and Rohlman, Diane S. (1994): Analyses of Factors Related to Positive Test Bias in Software Testing. In International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 41 (5) pp. 717-749
“In earlier work, we have shown that software testers exhibit positive test bias. Positive test bias is the pervasive behavioral phenomenon in which hypothesis testers tend to test a hypothesis with data which confirms the hypothesis. However, in software testing this behavior may be counter-productive, since it may be more effective to test with data which are designed to disconfirm the hypothesis. The first study considered how positive test bias is influenced by the expertise level of the subjects, the completeness of the software specifications and whether or not the programs contained errors. The results demonstrated strong evidence of positive test bias regardless of condition. The effects appear to be partially mitigated by increasingly higher levels of expertise and by increasingly more complete specifications. In some cases, the effect is also increased by the presence of errors. A second study used talk-aloud protocols to explore the kinds of hypotheses testers generate during testing. The results further emphasize that subjects test their programs in a biased way and support the notion that the program specification drives testers' hypotheses. We conclude that positive test bias is a critical concern in software testing and may have a seriously detrimental effect on the quality of testing. The results further emphasize the importance of complete and thorough program specifications in order to enhance effective testing.”
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» 1993 «
Teasley, Barbee Mynatt, Leventhal, Laura Marie and Rohlman, Diane S. (1993): Positive Test Bias in Software Testing by Professionals: What's Right and What's Wrong. In: Cook, Curtis, Scholtz, Jean and Spohrer, James C. (eds.) Empirical Studies of Programmers - Fifth Workshop December 3-15, 1993, 1993, Palo Alto, California. pp. 206-221.
“Software testing, which consumes substantial effort in software development, is a virtually unexplored area in human-computer interaction. At Bowling Green State University, we have a program of research which is looking at the application of judgment and decision-making theory to software testing, focusing on the role of positive test bias in software testing. Studies of naturalistic testing tasks, as well as ones which follow common laboratory models in this area, have found ample evidence that testers have a positive test bias. This bias is manifest as a tendency to execute about four times as many positive tests, designed to show that "the program works" (i.e., valid data), as tests which challenge the program (i.e., use invalid data). While positive tests do uncover errors in a program and need to be done, failure to do negative tests leaves much of the program invalidated. Our studies have also shown that the expertise of the subjects, the completeness of the software specifications, and the presence / absence of program errors may reduce positive test bias. Talk-aloud data suggests that advanced computer science students and professional programmers do invent specifications to test in the absence of actual specifications, but still exhibit positive test bias.”
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Leventhal, Laura Marie, Teasley, Barbee Mynatt, Instone, Keith, Rohlman, Diane S. and Farhat, John (1993): Sleuthing in HyperHolmes: An Evaluation of Using Hypertext vs. a Book to Answer Questions. In Behaviour and Information Technology, 12 (3) pp. 149-164
“Although hypertext offers exciting new ways of presenting and accessing information, there is little research which systematically compares the usability of hypertext against traditional media with an eye to improving the design of the hypertext. This paper presents the results of an experiment which examined the performance and navigation strategies of users engaged in a question-answering task using either a hypertext encyclopedia of Sherlock Holmes facts (the HyperHolmes system) or the traditional paper form. The results showed that, overall, the hypertext users were marginally more accurate in answering questions, and excelled at questions where the key information was embedded in a text entry. The book users were marginally faster overall, but excelled only in answering questions based on graphics. Hypertext users showed a preference for those tools which most closely mimicked use of a conventional book. They used a hierarchical structure to guide their navigation strategy in early trials, but soon learned to navigate in a non-hierarchical, flat way.”
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Leventhal, Laura Marie, Teasley, Barbee M., Rohlman, Diane S. and Instone, Keith (1993): Positive Test Bias in Software Testing among Professionals: A Review. In: East-West International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction: Proceedings of the EWHCI93 1993. pp. 45-54.
“Fundamental but virtually unexplored issues in human-computer interaction involve the roles of biases in software engineering tasks. In studies of naturalistic testing tasks, as well as ones which follow common laboratory models in this area, we have found ample evidence that testers have positive test bias. This bias is manifest as a tendency to execute about four times as many positive tests, designed to show that "the program works," as tests which challenge the program. In our prior work, we have found that the expertise of the subjects, the completeness of the software specifications, and the presence/absence of program errors may reduce positive test bias. Skilled computer scientists invent specifications to test in the absence of actual specifications, but still exhibit positive test bias.”
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» 1992 «
Mynatt, Barbee T., Leventhal, Laura Marie, Instone, Keith, Farhat, John and Rohlman, Diane S. (1992): Hypertext or Book: Which is Better for Answering Questions?. In: Bauersfeld, Penny, Bennett, John and Lynch, Gene (eds.) Proceedings of the ACM CHI 92 Human Factors in Computing Systems Conference June 3-7, 1992, Monterey, California. pp. 19-25. Available online
“An important issue in the evolution of hypertext is the design of such systems to optimally support user tasks such as asking questions. Few studies have systematically compared the use of hypertext to books in seeking information, and those that have been done have not found a consistent superiority for hypertext. In addition, designers developing hypertext books have few guidelines. In the present study, users performed information-seeking tasks and answered a variety of types of questions about Sherlock Holmes stories using either a conventional paper encyclopedia or a hypertext encyclopedia. The questions varied on the amount of information needed to derive an answer (fact or inference), the location of the question's key phrase in the hypertext (entry title or entry content), and the format of the information (text or map). Accuracy and time were recorded. The hypertext group excelled in answering fact questions where the information was embedded in a text entry. The book group excelled only in answering fact questions based on maps. In spite of having far more experience using books, the book group was not significantly faster overall and did not perform as well on an incidental learning task. Our results suggest that a hypertext book with a nonlinear structure and including a variety of navigational tools can equal or surpass conventional books as an information-seeking medium, even with minimal training.”
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Instone, Keith, Leventhal, Laura Marie, Teasley, Barbee Mynatt, Farhat, John and Rohlman, Diane S. (1992): What Do I Want? And How Do I Get There?: Performance and Navigation in Information Retrieval Tasks with Hypertext Documents. In: East-West International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction: Proceedings of the EWHCI92 1992. pp. 85-95.
“Two of the most important issues emerging in hypertext research deal with what do I want? and how do I get there? We have been exploring the issues of performance and navigation in a series of empirical studies of information retrieval using two hypertext documents, HyperHolmes and HyperAl. HyperHolmes is a hypertext version of an encyclopedia and can be navigated in many different ways, including searching, hypertext links, incoming links, and through an overlay of hierarchical overviews. HyperAl is a stack of a library card catalogue for an elementary school library and has similar design features and functionality to HyperHolmes. We have conducted several studies of information retrieval using these documents to identify factors that affect performance and patterns of navigation. In two performance studies, our results highlight that the task to be performed and characteristics of the users influence accuracy and speed of information retrieval. In navigation studies, we have found that users tend to follow hierarchical navigation patterns as they are learning to use hypertext documents. With practice, these users tend to follow less hierarchical navigation patterns.”
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Mar 20th, 2010
Changes to this page (author)
15 Feb 2010: Enabled abstracts to be shown on Diane S. Rohlman's author page.25 Jul 2007: Author was edited 25 Jul 2007: Author was edited
28 Apr 2003: Added the author to the bibliography
