Catharsis creates empirical open science research studies on topics of interest, with a goal toward contributing to a community-based behavioral science for software teams.

 

In this report, we wanted to explore how a learning science lens could deepen our understanding of code writers’ experiences.

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What could we hear from how code writers perceived their own learning and the expectations of their environment around learning? Why do so many code writers struggle to learn, even in highly resourced environments which have many formal processes for code review and many stated ideals of life-long skill development and growth? And can people involved in coding teams, from junior members to senior leaders, use insights from learning science to improve their experience in this work?

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This report presents data from a qualitative research project with twenty-five full-time code writers, who completed a “debugging” task and an in-depth interview on their learning, problem-solving, and feedback experiences while onboarding to a new collaborative codebase. We use the term "Learning Debt" to describe how an environment that discourages learning can dampen code writers' creativity and knowledge-sharing, and give practical recommendations for fostering a better learning culture.