The effects of communication media on group performance in requirements engineering

Delivering systems that meet all stakeholders´ needs is easier said than done in a software development world in which resource constraints are everyday realities. In particular, the negotiation between different stakeholders and the reconciliation of their conflicting viewpoints has been recognized as major problems in requirements engineering. This is even more challenging as organizations become more global, and requirements often come from distributed groups. Although the use of multimedia meeting systems is becoming a reality in distributed software development, our knowledge of how such systems impact group performance and their role in facilitating social processes in requirements engineering is limited. The paper reports on a study that compared the performance of groups in face-to-face and distributed requirements negotiation meetings, paying special consideration to the socio-psychological aspects of group interaction in both communication media