User Personas Improve Social Sustainability by Encouraging Software Developers to Deprioritize Antisocial Features
Bimpe Ayoola, Miikka Kuutila, Rina R. Wehbe, Paul Ralph

TL;DR
This study demonstrates that providing software developers with persona models can effectively reduce prioritization of antisocial features, supporting social sustainability in software engineering through a controlled experiment.
Contribution
It is the first experimental evidence showing that persona models influence antisocial feature prioritization in software development.
Findings
Persona models decrease antisocial feature prioritization.
Stakeholder maps showed no significant effect.
Methodology enables lab-based assessment of social sustainability behaviors.
Abstract
Sustainable software development involves creating software in a manner that meets present goals without undermining our ability to meet future goals. In a software engineering context, sustainability has at least four dimensions: ecological, economic, social, and technical. No interventions for improving social sustainability in software engineering have been tested in rigorous lab-based experiments, and little evidence-based guidance is available. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of two interventions-stakeholder maps and persona models-for improving social sustainability through software feature prioritization. We conducted a randomized controlled factorial experiment with 79 undergraduate computer science students. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four groups and asked to prioritize a backlog of prosocial, neutral, and antisocial user stories…
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Taxonomy
TopicsPersona Design and Applications · Technology Use by Older Adults · Innovative Human-Technology Interaction
