Does an awareness of differing types of spreadsheet errors aid end-users in identifying spreadsheets errors?

TL;DR

This study investigates whether awareness of different spreadsheet error types improves end-users' ability to identify errors, showing that experience and error-type awareness significantly enhance error detection, especially for subtle qualitative errors.

Contribution

It introduces a simplified error classification and demonstrates that error-type awareness and experience improve error identification in spreadsheets.

Findings

Over 85% of users are also the spreadsheet's developer.

Error-type awareness improves detection of subtle qualitative errors.

Spreadsheet experience correlates with better error identification.

Abstract

The research presented in this paper establishes a valid, and simplified, revision of previous spreadsheet error classifications. This investigation is concerned with the results of a web survey and two web-based gender and domain-knowledge free spreadsheet error identification exercises. The participants of the survey and exercises were a test group of professionals (all of whom regularly use spreadsheets) and a control group of students from the University of Greenwich (UK). The findings show that over 85% of users are also the spreadsheet's developer, supporting the revised spreadsheet error classification. The findings also show that spreadsheet error identification ability is directly affected both by spreadsheet experience and by error-type awareness. In particular, that spreadsheet error-type awareness significantly improves the user's ability to identify, the more surreptitious, qualitative error.