arXiv subjects

Emeralda Sesari

Publications and source records attributed to Emeralda Sesari.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Psychological Safety Framework in Pull-based Open Source Projects

Psychological safety (PS) refers to the belief that team members can speak up, ask questions, and make mistakes without fear of negative consequences. Although PS has been studied in traditional software teams, less is known about how it may appear in pull-based open-source software development, where contributors are self-directed and often collaborate voluntarily. This paper introduces a theory-informed framework for understanding how PS may be reflected in pull request (PR) interactions. We investigate the framework through a mixed-methods approach combining repository-based analysis and a survey of OSS contributors. First, we constructed a PS index using nine observable PR interaction indicators extracted from 60,685 PRs across 26 GitHub repositories. Second, we surveyed 57 OSS contributors about their perceived PS and experiences of corresponding PR interactions. All nine surveyed interaction indicators were significantly and positively associated with perceived PS. However, the repository-based index was not significantly associated with survey-reported PS. Contributors' open-ended responses further highlighted the importance of feedback quality, opportunities to participate, and how PR outcomes are interpreted. Together, our framework and mixed-methods findings provide initial insights into how PS may be reflected in PR interactions, highlighting the importance of both PR interaction patterns and contributors' experiences.

cs.SE↗

arXiv2026

Equal Access, Unequal Gains? GitHub Copilot and Productivity Among Developers with Disabilities

Generative AI tools are increasingly used in software development and have been associated with benefits such as faster task completion and improved perceived productivity. However, whether these benefits extend across different developer populations remains unclear. This is especially relevant for developers with disabilities, whose work can already be impacted by accessibility barriers. Yet, evidence remains limited across a broader range of disability groups. This study investigates whether the wider availability of GitHub Copilot is associated with changes in productivity among GitHub users who self-identify as having a disability. Using publicly available profile and repository data, we curated a dataset of 199 developers across multiple disability groups and compared their activity before and after GitHub Copilot became freely available. We found that most disability groups showed a descriptive pattern of fewer commits but more code modified. In several disability groups, the distribution of developers across commit activity levels shifted toward both lower and higher level, leaving fewer developers at moderate level. However, we found no evidence that changes in commits or net lines modified differed across disability groups. These findings suggest that the wider availability of GitHub Copilot cannot be associated with a broad increase or decrease in observable development activity, while patterns of change varied across developers and disability groups.

cs.SE↗

arXiv2025

It is Giving Major Satisfaction: Why Fairness Matters for Software Practitioners

Software practitioners often encounter workplace unfairness, such as unequal recognition and gender bias. While the link between fairness and job satisfaction has been established in other fields, its relevance to software professionals remains underexplored. This study examines how fairness perceptions relate to job satisfaction among software practitioners, focusing on both general trends and demographic-specific differences. We conducted an online survey of 108 software practitioners, followed by ordinal logistic regression to analyze the relationship between fairness perceptions and job satisfaction in software engineering contexts, with moderation analysis examining how this relationship varies across demographic groups. Our findings indicate that all four fairness dimensions (namely distributive, procedural, interpersonal, and informational fairness) significantly affect overall job satisfaction and satisfaction with job security. Among these, interpersonal fairness has the biggest impact. The relationship between fairness and job satisfaction is stronger for female, ethnically underrepresented, less experienced practitioners, and those with work limitations. Fairness in authorship emerged as an important factor for job satisfaction collectively, while fairness in policy implementation, high-demand situations, and working hours impacted specific demographic groups. This study highlights the role of fairness among software practitioners, offering strategies for organizations to promote fair practices and targeted approaches for certain demographic groups.

cs.SE↗

arXiv2024

Understanding Fairness in Software Engineering: Insights from Stack Exchange

Software practitioners discuss problems at work with peers, in-person and online. These discussions can be technical (e.g., how to fix a bug?) and social (e.g., how to assign work fairly?). While there is a growing body of knowledge exploring fairness problems and solutions in the human and social factors of software engineering, most focus has been on specific problems. This study provides fairness discussions by software practitioners on Stack Exchange sites. We present an exploratory study presenting the fairness experience of software practitioners and fairness expectations in software teams. We also want to identify the fairness aspects software practitioners talk about the most. For example, do they care more about fairness in income or how they are treated in the workplace? Our investigation of fairness discussions on eight Stack Exchange sites resulted in a list of 136 posts (28 questions and 108 answers) manually curated from 4,178 candidate posts. The study reveals that the majority of fairness discussions (24 posts) revolve around the topic of income suggesting that many software practitioners are highly interested in matters related to their pay and how it is fairly distributed. Further, we noted that while not discussed as often, discussions on fairness in recruitment tend to receive the highest number of views and scores. Interestingly, the study shows that unfairness experiences extend beyond the protected attributes. In this study, only 25 out of 136 posts mention protected attributes, with gender mainly being discussed.

cs.SE↗