A Neuro-Cognitive Perspective of Program Comprehension

Program comprehension is the cognitive process of understanding code. Researchers have proposed several models to describe program comprehension. However, because program comprehension is an internal process and difficult to measure, the accuracy of the existing models are limited. Neuro-imaging methods, such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), provide a novel neuro-cognitive perspective to program-comprehension research. With my thesis work, we aim at establishing fMRI as a new tool for program-comprehension and software-engineering studies. Furthermore, we seek to refine our existing framework for conducting fMRI studies by extending it with eye tracking and improved control conditions. We describe how we will apply our upgraded framework to extend our understanding of program comprehension. In the long-run, we would like to contribute insights from our fMRI studies into software-engineering practices by providing code-styling guidelines and programming tools, which reduce the required cognitive effort to comprehend code.