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Code Review Anxiety Workbook

Published onJul 03, 2024
Code Review Anxiety Workbook

Feeling anxious about giving and receiving code reviews is a common, widely-documented experience for software developers. This experience is called code review anxiety, and it’s characterized by a fear of judgment, criticism, and negative evaluation. It can lead software developers to engage in a variety of counterproductive behaviors, such as avoiding code reviews, engaging in "rubber stamping", or procrastinating in opening and reviewing pull requests, among other things.

In the GitBook linked below, you’ll find a self-guided version of the workshop intervention that we ran with our research participants in the study Understanding and Effectively Mitigating Code Review Anxiety. Fair warning: There’s a lot of information here! And it’s all meant to help. So tackle it in a single session, if that best suits you (we recommend setting aside around 90 minutes), or go through it in smaller sessions. Work through the workbook on your own, if you so choose (talking about our anxiety is a vulnerable act!), or – if you have friends or colleagues who you think might be interested – maybe start a Code Review Anxiety Workbook Club and benefit from the power of group sharing and learning!

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