On integrating ethicality in user stories

Abstract

In recent years, software has increasingly become anthropomorphic, even autocratic. For example, software is being used exclusively for activities, such as decision-making, question-answering, or recommending, that in the past were either partly or entirely human. This has only contributed to the enduring issue of software ethics. In that regard, this paper models ethicality as a meta-quality attribute and proposes an ethically-sensitive, standards-based, technology-and-tool-independent, semi-formal framework, comprising interrelated conceptual (meta-)models that provide an understanding of ethicality, user story environment, and user story process. It outlines an approach of integrating ethicality naturally and systematically in the user story process, and provides illustrative and representative examples in support of this approach. Finally, it presents the results of a preliminary survey of students and professionals on their knowledge and experience of ethics in (agile) software projects.