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<b>Background:</b> Despite a similar education and background, programmers can exhibit vast differences in efficacy. While research has identified some potential factors, such as programming experience and domain knowledge, the effect of these factors on programmers' efficacy is not well understood.<br>
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<b>Aims:</b> We aim at unravelling the relationship between efficacy (speed and correctness) and measures of programming experience. We further investigate the correlates of programmer efficacy in terms of reading behavior and cognitive load.<br>
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<b>Method:</b> For this purpose, we conducted a controlled experiment with 37~participants using electroencephalography (EEG) and eye tracking. We asked participants to comprehend up to 32~Java source-code snippets and observed their eye gaze and neural correlates of cognitive load. We analyzed the correlation of participants' efficacy with popular programming experience measures.<br>
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<b>Results:</b> We found that programmers with high efficacy read source code more targeted and with lower cognitive load. Commonly used experience levels do not predict programmer efficacy well, but self-estimation and indicators of learning eagerness are fairly accurate.<br>
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<b>Implications:</b> The identified correlates of programmers with high efficacy can be used for future research and practice, such as hiring. Future research should also consider efficacy as a group sampling method, rather than simple experience measures.<br>
<b>Background:</b> Researchers and practitioners have been using code complexity metrics for decades to predict how developers comprehend a program. While it is plausible and tempting to use them for this purpose, their validity is questionable, since they rely on code properties and rarely consider particularities of human cognition.<br>
<b>Background:</b> The way how programmers comprehend source code depends on several factors, including the source code itself and the programmer. Recent studies showed that novice programmers tend to read source code more like natural language text, whereas experts tend to follow the program execution flow. But, it is unknown how the <i>linearity of source code</i> and the comprehension strategy influence programmers' <i>linearity of reading order</i>.<br>
@@ -253,8 +280,8 @@ <h3>Indentation: Simply a Matter of Style or Support for Program Comprehension?
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