Survey Guidelines in Software Engineering: An Annotated Review

Background: Survey is a method of research aiming to gather data from a large population of interest. Despite being extensively used in software engineering, survey-based research faces several challenges, such as selecting a representative population sample and designing the data collection instruments. Objective: This article aims to summarize the existing guidelines, supporting instruments and recommendations on how to conduct and evaluate survey-based research. Methods: A systematic search using manual search and snowballing techniques were used to identify primary studies supporting survey research in software engineering. We used an annotated review to present the findings, describing the references of interest in the research topic. Results: The summary provides a description of 15 available articles addressing the survey methodology, based upon which we derived a set of recommendations on how to conduct survey research, and their impact in the community. Conclusion: Survey-based research in software engineering has its particular challenges, as illustrated by several articles in this review. The annotated review can contribute by raising awareness of such challenges and present the proper recommendations to overcome them.