Software is now a part of almost every aspect of our lives, and its impact on people and society is becoming clear. This raises important questions about how software is designed and developed. It challenges software engineers, designers, social psychologists, and policymakers to find ways to thoughtfully embed human values and social norms into software engineering practices and products. With AI playing an increasing role in software development, ethical and responsible decision-making is more important than ever. Developing tools and frameworks to integrate these values into the development process can help ensure AI benefits society in meaningful ways.
For software to succeed, it must earn people’s trust. Initiatives in “responsible software engineering” aim to address concerns around building this trust (Schieferdecker, 2020). However, despite many existing guidelines, there’s little clarity on who is responsible, how responsibility is shared, and what aspects of software-related harm are addressed (Munn, 2023). This highlights the need to better understand how responsibility in software engineering can be identified, captured, and applied.
This PhD offers an exciting opportunity to explore responsibility in software engineering. It goes beyond simply following ethical guidelines, aiming to uncover how responsibility is understood and to create innovative tools and methods that promote responsible software development. This includes gathering insights from both users and developers about their views on responsibility and designing tools to support the development of responsible software. The ultimate aim is to create an approach that fairly distributes responsibility across everyone involved in the software ecosystem, especially as AI becomes more integrated into software. By moving past basic ethical guidelines, this research will explore how to embed responsibility into software development, tackling social norms and practices that may unintentionally compromise responsible practices in software engineering.
The most important skills for this PhD topic are scientific curiosity, a strong analytical mindset, and the ability to critically examine and challenge established norms and practices. Ideally, you should have a first degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a closely related field. Alternatively, a postgraduate conversion degree in Computing would also be suitable. Familiarity with current software engineering practices is essential, alongside proficiency in empirical research methods such as data collection and both quantitative and qualitative analysis. Strong communication skills are also crucial to effectively share complex ideas with diverse audiences.
Robinson, S., Buckley, J., Ciolfi, L., Linehan, C., McInerney, C., Nuseibeh, B., Twomey, J., Rauf, I. and McCarthy, J., 2024. Infrastructural Justice for Responsible Software Engineering. Journal of Responsible Technology, p.100087.
Nuseibeh, B. (2021) Software without boundaries, LinkedIn. Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/software-without-boundaries-bashar-nuseibeh/ (Accessed: 19 December 2024).
Schieferdecker, I. (2019) ‘Responsible software engineering’, The Future of Software Quality Assurance, pp. 137–146. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-29509-7_11.
Munn, L., 2023. The uselessness of AI ethics. AI and Ethics, 3(3), pp.869-877.
Rauf, I., Petre, M., Tun, T., Lopez, T. and Nuseibeh, B., 2023, May. Security thinking in online freelance software development. In 2023 IEEE/ACM 45th International Conference on Software Engineering: Software Engineering in Society (ICSE-SEIS) (pp. 13-24). IEEE.
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