Ethical Considerations in Case Studies

Abstract

High-level ethical principles have been introduced in software engineering. However, ethical concerns in empirical case studies require further investigation. This study aims to investigate ethical considerations in case studies of software engineering and evaluate the identified ethical concerns through a multi-case study in industry. 12 papers were selected and reviewed to extract ethical considerations, and an evidence-based analysis through coding is performed. As a result, 21 ethical considerations in total have been identified and mapped to case study design steps. 21 recommended actions have been proposed to mitigate ethical considerations based on the experience while adopting case studies in four software development companies, which could be used as a guideline for practitioners to conduct empirical studies in practice from the ethical perspective.