tl;dr Avoid using qualitative research methods in technology-centered software engineering research as you might not be lucky with your reviewers
Anyone following me along knows I love my 2×2 matrices. So here is another one, showing my experiences with research methodologies (qualitative or quantitative) vs. software engineering research (human-centered or technology-centered).
With human-centered research I’m talking about research that focuses on humans in software engineering (e.g. how to help developers avoid bugs), and with technology-centered I’m talking about research that focuses on, well, technology (e.g. how to avoid bugs automatically without a human in the loop).
Today, reviewers of human-centered software engineering research are typically well versed in both qualitative research (e.g. interview studies) and quantitative research (e.g. controlled experiments). Reviewers of technology-centered software engineering research also tend to understand quantitative methods.
However, in my sadly still recent experience researchers focused on technology-centered research can be out of their water when it comes to qualitative methods. We are active in all four quadrants, and our papers (and the corresponding doctoral students) using qualitative methods for technology-centered research had to suffer the most, time and again.
Avoid that quadrant if you can.
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