How to Classify Personalities of Team Members on
Project-Based Learning
Masateru Tsunoda

Haruaki Tamada

Kindai University
Kyoto Sangyo University
3-4-1 Kowakae, Higashiosaka City, Motoyama, Kamigamo, Kita-ku, Kyoto,Osaka 577-8502, Japan603-8555 Japantsunoda@info.kindai.ac.jp
tamada@cse.kyoto-su.ac.jp

ABSTRACT
Recently, PBL (Project-Based Learning) is sometimes applied tosoftware engineering education. When PBL is applied, softwaredevelopment teams are made. For the teams, influence of thepersonality of each member is not negligible. The personality willaffect performance of the team and it may also influence the effectof education. So, we focus the personality and discuss how tomeasure and classify it.

Categories and Subject Descriptors
D.2.9 [Software Engineering]: Management – Programming
teams, K.6.1 [Computing Milieux]: Project and People
Management – Staffing

General Terms
Management, Measurement, Performance, Human Factors.

Keywords
Personality, Team construction, Classification.

1. INTRODUCTION
Recently, PBL (Project-Based Learning) get much attention on
software engineering education, especially in Japan. On PBL,
students solve some problems by themselves, instead of classroom
lecture. When PBL is applied to software engineering education,
software development team is sometimes made, and students
make software on the team. The activity is similar to the work insoftware development companies.
In software development companies, most software is developedby a team which consists of a project manager, system engineers,programmers, and so on. To develop software, they perform theirwork and communicate with each other. Hence, human side of themembers is considered to affect activities of softwaredevelopment. Members may have adequacy of a role. For example,a person would be adequate for programmer, although he/she is
not adequate for project manager. That could affect the efficiencyof the development, if their role is inadequate for them. Also, if
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Hideaki Hata
Nara Institute of Science andTechnologyKansai Science City, 630-0192
Japan
hata@is.naist.jp

the distribution of characteristics of team members is biased, thatmay decrease the efficiency of communication between them. For
instance, if all team members have introverted personality, it
would affect communication between them, and it may decrease
the efficiency of software development.
We think that likewise, on PBL of software engineering education,
the influence of the human side of each member is not negligible
for the teams. The personality would affect performance of theteam and it may also influence the effect of education. So, we
focus on the human side of software development team members,
especially personality of them.
First, we surveyed researches which addressed personality ofmembers in a software development team. We focus on not only asoftware developer but also a software development team. So, wemainly picked up researches which treated relationships between
personality of members and the performance of a team. Next,
based on the existing researches, we discussed the drawbacks ofthem, and what is needed to analyze the relationships between
personality of members.

2. RESEARCH OF PERSONALITY IN
SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
Some researches indicate that there is the relationship between
performance of a software development team and personality ofthe members [1][2][4][5][7][9]. For example, Gorla et al. [4]conducted a survey about the personality, the role in a team, theperformance of their team for 92 software developers. To evaluate
the performance, they used six indices such as quality andefficiency. The indices were rated on a five-point scale. The
personality was measured using MBTI (Myers-Briggs TypeIndicator) [6]. MBTI classifies personality into 16 categories,
based on answers to several tens of questionnaire items. Theirresult suggests that there are some personalities which adequate
for a role, and the adequate roles enhance the performance of theteam. For example, when a system analyst is thinking type
personality, team performance is high.
Acuña et al. [1] analyzed influence of personality of team member
to project results such as software quality. They analyzed dataset
which was collected from 35 teams which consist of 105 students.
The software was developed applying agile software process.
Based on the analysis results of the dataset, they showed
extraversion of team members positively affects software quality.
To identify the personality of a team member, they used NEO-FFI,
which is based on the five-factor model. The five-factor model
does not classify personality according to type, but evaluates
personality based on degree of five factors (neuroticism,extraversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness).
The NEO-FFI measures the factors based on answers to several
tens of questionnaire items.
Licorish et al. [5] surveyed the existing researches, and based onthat, they indicated the importance of personality of team member
on software development. Also, they proposed a prototype tool
which supports the selection of team members for agile softwaredevelopment. Using the tool, a project manager checks
information of each member such as personality, and set roles ofmembers. To classify the personality, the tool uses Belbin Team
Roles [3]. The Belbin shows there are 8 roles when a teamsucceeds, and explains strong points and weak points of the roles.
The role is settled on the answers to several tens of questionnaire
items. It confirmed that there are the relationships between theroles and the personalities [7]. So, the Belbin Team Roles isregarded as classification of the personality.
MBTI and the five-factor model are used widely to analyze theinfluence of personality on software development. For instance,
Salleh et at. [8] showed 12 existing researches which analyze theinfluence of personality on the pair programming. On them, fiveresearches used MBTI, and three researches used the five-factormodel. The Belbin Team Roles is often used to analyze theinfluence of personality to a development team.

3. NECESSITY OF A NEW
CLASSIFICATION METHOD
The existing researches suggest that the personality of teammembers is not negligible on software development. Hence, it isbetter to utilize information about the personality of teammembers when building a software team. However, to utilize it,
the existing methods (i.e., MBTI, the five-factor model, and theBelbin Team Roles) are insufficient on the following points:
1.
2.

The classifications of the existing methods do not specializein the software engineering field.
To classify the personality, data should be collected using aquestionnaire.

Although the existing methods can to apply not only software
engineering field but also other fields, the granularity is not
appropriate, considering the application to software development
analysis. If the granularity is more appropriate, we may get more
useful findings when analyzing the personality of team members,
and utilize them when building a software team.
Also, the existing methods do not assume that personality of teammembers is measured automatically, based on a dataset such as asoftware repository. They use a questionnaire to measure thepersonality. To measure it automatically, it is needed to reconsider
the classification and measurement methods of the personality. If
the personality of team members can be measured automatically,
we can analyze the influence of personality to softwaredevelopment teams on PBL more easily.
If we can know the personality of students based on theclassification, it is expected for us to get the following effects onPBL.
Students can experience team software development, when
the team is built with appropriate and inappropriate role. Itwill give chance to students to consider the appropriate rolein software development.
Teaches can control performance of a software development
team on PBL to some extent, assigning appropriate roles tostudents, based on their personality. It would make easier tocontrol goal of the education.

4. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This research was partially supported by the Japan Ministry ofEducation, Science, Sports, and Culture [Grant-in-Aid for
Exploratory Research (No. 26540029) and Grant-in-Aid for
Scientific Research (C) (No. 25330090)]

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