An Empirical Study on the Comprehension of Stereotyped UML Class Diagram Layouts

An empirical study is presented that investigates how stereotype based layouts impact the comprehension of UML class diagrams. This work replicates a previous study using eye-tracking equipment but uses online questionnaires instead. Subjects were given two types of tasks: one addressing UML syntax and the other addressing software design. Three different layout strategies are compared. Along with general aesthetics, the layouts are primarily organized by class stereotypes of control, boundary, and entity. A confidence value for each question was collected from the subjects to help validate the categorization of subjects. Results of the study are compared and contrasted to the eye-tracking study done with the same tasks and layouts. Results show a significant improvement in performance in both types of tasks with the multi-cluster stereotyped layouts.