Sampling in Software Engineering Research: A Critical Review and Guidelines
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Representative sampling appears rare in software engineering research. Not all studies need representative samples, but a general lack of representative sampling undermines a scientific field. This study therefore investigates the state of sampling in recent, high-quality software engineering research. The key findings are: (1) random sampling is rare; (2) sophisticated sampling strategies are very rare; (3) sampling, representativeness and randomness do not appear well-understood. To address these problems, the paper synthesizes existing knowledge of sampling into a succinct primer and proposes extensive guidelines for improving the conduct, presentation and evaluation of sampling in software engineering research. It is further recommended that while researchers should strive for more representative samples, disparaging non-probability sampling is generally capricious and particularly misguided for predominately qualitative research.
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