skip to main content
10.1145/3328833.3328848acmotherconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesicsieConference Proceedingsconference-collections
research-article

Brainstorming versus a Scenario-based Approach: Results of an Empirical Study

Published: 09 April 2019 Publication History

Abstract

Although important advances have been made to improve the requirements elicitation process, this problem is still a challenging research topic for the Requirements Engineering community. Motivated by this fact, we propose the CREAS method (Creative Requirements Elicitation Assisted by Scenarios), an approach for requirements elicitation that leverages and brings together scenario-based and creativity techniques. In this paper, we seek to answer the following research question: Does CREAS have a better impact on the elicitation of requirements with respect to a Brainstorming process? To answer this question, we have designed and run a quasi-experiment to compare CREAS and Brainstorming under similar conditions. The participants were required to elicit the requirements for two different problems in two different sessions using both approaches. Results evidence the existence of significant differences between the methods. The statistical outcomes show that the requirements obtained with CREAS are more complete, precise and present less over-specification.

References

[1]
Cheng, B.H.C., Atlee, J.M. 2007. "Research Directions in Requirements Engineering". In Proceedings Future of Software Engineering (FOSE'07), p. 285--303.
[2]
Nuseibeh, B., Easterbrook, S. 2000. "Requirements Engineering: a roadmap". In Proceedings of the conference of the Future of Software Engineering, p. 35--46.
[3]
Sternberg, R.J., Lubart, T. 1995. Defying the Crowd: Cultivating Creativity in a Culture of Conformity, Free Press.
[4]
Maiden, N., Jones, S., Karlsen, K., Neill, R., Milne, A. 2010. Requirements Engineering as Creative Problem Solving: A Research Agenda for Idea Finding. 18th IEEE International Requirements Engineering Conference (RE), Sydney.
[5]
Robertson, J. 2005. "Requirements analysts must also be inventors", IEEE Software, vol. 22, no 1, p. 48, 50.
[6]
Jaramillo, A., Assar, S. 2016. Leveraging creativity techniques in requirements elicitation: a literature review. Requirements Engineering Magazine. International Requirements Engineering Board. Issue 2016-02.
[7]
Mendling, J., Recker, J., Reijers, H. 2010. On the usage of labels and icons in business process modeling. International Journal of Information System Modeling and Design, 1(2), 40--58.
[8]
Metzler, T., Shea, K. 2011. Taxonomy of cognitive functions. Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Engineering Design. ICED11.
[9]
van Lamsweerde, A., Feather, M.S., Fickas, S., Finkelstein A. 1997. "Requirements and specification exemplars," Automated Software. Engineering, vol. 4, no. 4, pp. 419--438.
[10]
Regnell, B., Höst, M., Wohlin, C. 2000. Using students as subjects---A comparative study of students and professionals in lead-time impact assessment. Empirical Software Engineering, 5, 201--214. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston. Manufactured in The Netherlands.
[11]
Cleland-Huang, J. 2019. https://terapromise.csc.ncsu.edu/repo/requirements/nfr/nfr.arff
[12]
Pastor, Ó., González, A., Condori-Fernández, N., España, S. 2010. An empirical comparative evaluation of requirements engineering methods. Brazilian Computer Society.
[13]
Harmain, H., Gaizauskas, R.: CM-Builder. 2000. An automated NL-Based CASE Tool. Proceedings of the Fifteenth IEEE International Conference on Automated Software Engineering (ASE'00). Grenoble.
[14]
Berry, D., Mich, L., Anesi, C. 2005. Applying a pragmatics-based creativity-fostering technique to requirements elicitation. Requirements Engineering Journal.
[15]
Barret, J.R. 2013. "Particulate Matter and Cardiovascular Disease: Researchers Turn an Eye Toward Microvascular Changes". Environmental Health Perspectives. 121--282.
[16]
Meyers, L.S. 2006. Applied multivariate research: design and interpretation/ Lawrence S. Meyers, Glenn Gamst, A.J. Guarino, SAGE Publications, Thousand Oaks.
[17]
Tabachnick, B.G., Fidell, L.S. 2001. Using Multivariate Statistics. 4th Edition. New York: Allyn & Bacon.
[18]
Dybå, T., Kampenes, V.B., Sjøberg, D.I.K. 2006. A systematic review of statistical power in software engineering experiments, Inf. Softw. Technol. 48. 745--755.
[19]
Panach, J.I., España S., Dieste Ó., Pastor Ó., Juristo N. 2015. In search of evidence for model-driven development claims: An experiment on quality, effort, productivity and satisfaction. Information & Software Technology 62: 164--186.
[20]
Grissom, R.J., Kim J.J.: Effect Sizes for Research. 2005. A Broad Practical Approach, Taylor & Francis Group.
[21]
Macbeth, G., Razumiejczyk, E., Ledesma, R.D.: Cliff's Delta Calculator. 2011. A non-parametric effect size program for two groups of observations. Universitas Psychologica, 10 (2), 545--555.
[22]
Kitchenham, B., Dyba, T., Jorgensen, M. 2004. "Evidence-based software engineering," in Proc. of the 26th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE04), pp. 273--281.
[23]
Morandini, M., Marchetto, A., Perini, A. 2011. Requirements comprehension: A controlled experiment on conceptual modeling methods. First International Workshop on Empirical Requirements Engineering (EmpiRE).
[24]
Mahaux, M., Nguyen, L., Mich, L., Mavin, A. 2014. A framework for understanding collaborative creativity in requirements engineering: Empirical validation. Workshop on Empirical Requirements Engineering (EmpiRE), IEEE Fourth International.
[25]
Labunets, K., Paci, F., Massacci, F., Ruprai, R. 2014. An experiment on comparing textual vs. visual industrial methods for security risk assessment. IEEE Fourth International Workshop on Empirical Requirements Engineering (EmpiRE).
[26]
Daneva, M., Damian, D., Marchetto, A., Pastor, O. 2014. Empirical research methodologies and studies in Requirements Engineering: How far did we come? The Journal of Systems and Software 95. 1--9.
[27]
Condori-Fernandez, N., Daneva, M., Sikkel, K., Wieringa, R., Dieste, O., Pastor, O. 2009. A systematic mapping study on empirical evaluation of software requirements specifications techniques. ESEM 2009. 3rd International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement.
[28]
Oliveira, M., Viana, D., Conte, T., Vieira, S., Marczak, S. 2013. Evaluating the REMO-EKD technique: a technique for the elicitation of software requirements base don EKD organizational models. Empirical Requirements Engineering (EmpiRE). IEEE Third International Workshop on. P. 9--16.
[29]
Davis, A., Dieste, O., Hickey, A., Juristo, N., Moreno, A.M. 2006. Effectiveness of Requirements Elicitation Techniques: Empirical Results Derived from a Systematic Review. Requirements Engineering, 14th IEEE International Conference.
[30]
Madeyski L., Kitchenham B. 2018. Effect sizes and their variance for AB/BA crossover design studies. Empirical Software Engineering. 23: 1982.
[31]
Hermann, A., Mich, L., Berry, D. 2018. Creativity Techniques for Requirements Elicitation: Comparing Four-Step EPMcreate-Based Processes. IEEE 7th International Workshop on Empirical Requirements Engineering (EmpiRE).

Cited By

View all
  • (2022)Elicitation of adaptive requirements using creativity triggersProceedings of the 37th ACM/SIGAPP Symposium on Applied Computing10.1145/3477314.3507076(1318-1326)Online publication date: 25-Apr-2022

Index Terms

  1. Brainstorming versus a Scenario-based Approach: Results of an Empirical Study

    Recommendations

    Comments

    Information & Contributors

    Information

    Published In

    cover image ACM Other conferences
    ICSIE '19: Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Software and Information Engineering
    April 2019
    276 pages
    ISBN:9781450361057
    DOI:10.1145/3328833
    © 2019 Association for Computing Machinery. ACM acknowledges that this contribution was authored or co-authored by an employee, contractor or affiliate of a national government. As such, the Government retains a nonexclusive, royalty-free right to publish or reproduce this article, or to allow others to do so, for Government purposes only.

    Publisher

    Association for Computing Machinery

    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 09 April 2019

    Permissions

    Request permissions for this article.

    Check for updates

    Author Tags

    1. Creative requirements elicitation
    2. Empirical study
    3. Requirements elicitation

    Qualifiers

    • Research-article
    • Research
    • Refereed limited

    Conference

    ICSIE '19

    Contributors

    Other Metrics

    Bibliometrics & Citations

    Bibliometrics

    Article Metrics

    • Downloads (Last 12 months)8
    • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)3
    Reflects downloads up to 05 Mar 2025

    Other Metrics

    Citations

    Cited By

    View all
    • (2022)Elicitation of adaptive requirements using creativity triggersProceedings of the 37th ACM/SIGAPP Symposium on Applied Computing10.1145/3477314.3507076(1318-1326)Online publication date: 25-Apr-2022

    View Options

    Login options

    View options

    PDF

    View or Download as a PDF file.

    PDF

    eReader

    View online with eReader.

    eReader

    Figures

    Tables

    Media

    Share

    Share

    Share this Publication link

    Share on social media