How many bugs have you missed that were clearly easy to spot?
Testers approach all phases of testing hampered by their own biases in what to look for, how to go about setting up and executing tests, and how to interpret the results. These biases cause less than outstanding testing performance and data interpretation in an environment where test teams expect results to be cut and dried. The data is good by itself, but what we measure, and what decisions we make about the data, are driven by our own understandings and misunderstandings of the project and the goals of testing.
This paper will give testers and their managers an understanding of how their own mindsets and biases influence their testing. Testers and test managers will learn how to use this understanding to develop ways of managing their thinking and improving their testing. Using principles from the social sciences, such as Kahneman’s[7] framework for critical thinking and Chabris and Simons [2] findings on attention, perception and memory, we will demonstrate to you that you aren’t as smart as you think.
We’ll show you how to improve your test results by understanding how you think and the role that biases play in testing. We’ll discuss the balance between scripted and exploratory testing and how to use each effectively, and we’ll show how test managers can help their teams maintain their focus individually and as a team. Finally, we’ll provide tips for managing your biases and focusing your attention in the right places throughout the test process so you won’t miss that obvious bug.
