Complete thesis - Murdoch University

Given the nature of RE problems, the discipline has been characterised as a ‘wicked’ (Bubenko,1995). In a similar vein, RE education has been referred to as an ‘educational dilemma’(Macauley and Mylopoulos, 1995a). The dilemma is to provide the student with a solidfoundation in subject matter while at the same time exposing the student to the inherentcharacteristics associated with real requirements problems and the knowledge required tosolve them.In order to address both this wickedness and educational dilemma, the Requirements Engineeringstudent must acquire cognitive flexibility – including the ability to represent knowledgefrom different conceptual and case perspectives and, later, the ability to construct from thesea knowledge ensemble tailored to the needs of the understanding or problem-solving at hand– the same items of knowledge need to be presented and learned in a variety of different waysand for a variety of different purposes.In summary, practitioners of RE should be cognitively complex. The virtue of a cognitivelycomplex person is evident only when the environment requires them to deal with complexconditions and a high level of uncertainty (Lee and Truex, 2000): characteristics of the REenvironment.Bieri et al (1966) suggestsa more cognitively complex person has available a more differentiated system ofdimensions for perceiving others’ behaviour than does a less cognitively complexindividual(Bieri et al, 1966, p 185)and hence the capacity to construe social behaviour in a multidimensional way. This alsopoints to a requirement for cognitive complexity in an RE.However, both practitioners (Macauley and Mylopoulos, 1995b; Minor, 2004) and academics(Bentley et al, 1999; Banks, 2003) question whether attaining these attributes could/shouldbe taught and learned (and hence included in university education). Theories of learning,and models that apply these do suggest it is feasible to address concerns about RE educationformally.The theories of learning highlight aspects of knowledge and skill development that are pertinentto Requirements Engineering: competence in an area is based on a rich framework ofunderstanding and a commensurate reduction of effort in further learning (Craik and Lockhart,1972; Craik and Tulving, 1975), achieved through:99