5.3 Threats and Limitations
Case studies involving students can be criticized on the basis of
their degree of external validity, and this is a subject which has
been discussed in the literature. The degree of validity of this
study has been increased by relying on senior software
engineering students enrolled in their last semester, who have had
some internship experience in industry before, and who have been
carefully selected based on their professional experience and
superior grades.
For some authors, the line between these students and novice
professionals is becoming blurred [22], [23]. These authors
conclude that only minor differences exist between students and
professionals regarding their ability to perform tasks requiring
judgment. Similar results were obtained in a study about detection
methodologies for software requirement inspection conducted
with students [24] and then replicated with professionals [25].
Based on the literature, final-year software engineering students
are qualified to participate in empirical software engineering
research.