Treffer: An Experimental Evaluation of Data Type Conventions.

The language in which programs are written can have a substantial effect on the reliability of the resulting programs. This paper discusses an experiment that compares the programming reliability of subjects using a statically typed language and a "typeless" language. Analysis of the number of errors and the number of runs containing errors shows that, at least in one environment, the use of a statically typed language can increase programming reliability. Detailed analysis of the errors made by the subjects in programming solutions to reasonably small problems shows that the subjects had difficulty manipulating the representation of data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Communications of the ACM is the property of Association for Computing Machinery and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)