Coding Like a Rockstar: The Role of Social Influence on Action Patterns in GitHub

Title: Coding Like a Rockstar: The Role of Social Influence on Action Patterns in GitHub
Creator: Thomas Grisold; Michael Gau; Youngjin Yoo
Abstract: Action patterns occur wherever people perform work. Research has provided important insights about how action patterns form, change and dissolve over time. However, it has neglected the question of why actors choose to enact certain action patterns. In this research-in-progress, we shed light on the socio-cognitive factors underlying the formation of action patterns. We focus on GitHub and argue that so-called ‘rockstars’ exert social influence on other developers’ action patterns over time. As a preliminary step, we showcase the plausibility of this argument by examining an actual project where we see indications that the influence of a rockstar is reflected in the types of actions that are predominantly used. We will continue this research by including (1) more projects and rockstars, and (2) the analysis of action networks to test if action networks converge with those of rockstars over time.
Date: 2021
Language: en