---
source: arxiv
url: http://arxiv.org/abs/2603.07419v1
published_at: '2026-03-08T02:24:17'
authors:
- Juliane Pascoal
- Cleytton Magalhaes
- Ronnie de Souza Santos
topics:
- regression-testing
- remote-work
- hybrid-work
- software-testing
- qualitative-study
relevance_score: 0.62
run_id: materialize-outputs
language_code: en
---

# Regression Testing in Remote and Hybrid Software Teams: An Exploratory Study of Processes, Tools, and Practices

## Summary
This paper examines how regression testing is organized, executed, and coordinated in remote and hybrid work environments through qualitative interviews with 20 software practitioners. The core conclusion is that the basic stages of regression testing have not changed, but their effective execution increasingly depends on documentation, automation, tool integration, and traceable asynchronous collaboration mechanisms.

## Problem
- The paper addresses the question of **how regression testing processes, tools, and collaboration practices change in remote/hybrid teams**, and how these changes affect quality assurance.
- This matters because regression testing is used to prevent code changes from breaking existing functionality, and in prior studies cited in the paper, it typically accounts for **50%–80% of the total verification or maintenance budget**, making it a costly but critical activity.
- Remote and hybrid work weaken in-person verbal communication and immediate feedback, creating challenges related to time zones, infrastructure access, tool interoperability, and defect coordination. Therefore, it is necessary to understand how teams maintain testing reliability and efficiency under distributed conditions.

## Approach
- The authors use an **exploratory qualitative study**: structured interviews with **20** software professionals who have experience with both remote and on-site regression testing.
- The interviews cover three main threads: **processes** (how regression testing is planned and executed), **tools** (which tools support or constrain testing), and the **remote/hybrid context** (how communication, collaboration, efficiency, and defect management change).
- The participants are diverse, covering **3–15 years** of experience, different seniority levels, different client regions, and platforms such as web/mobile/desktop/VR/AR, and including both manual and automated testing practices.
- Data analysis uses **thematic analysis**: transcription, coding, categorization, and synthesis, followed by review by two researchers to reach agreement; this was then followed by **member checking** with all 20 participants to validate whether the interpretations matched practice.
- Put simply, this paper does not propose a new algorithm; rather, it **uses interviews to identify the most common practices, dependencies, and pain points in how remote teams conduct regression testing**, and to determine which collaboration mechanisms have replaced earlier face-to-face ways of working.

## Results
- The study is based on **20** interviews, with data collection from **January 2024 to April 2025**. Each interview lasted about **30–50 minutes**; theoretical saturation began to emerge around the **14th** interview and was confirmed by the **17th**, with all 20 completed to ensure coverage.
- During result validation, the authors sent a summary questionnaire to **20** participants and received **17** responses; the paper states that this feedback generally confirmed the study's interpretations, with only minor adjustments to wording and precision.
- The paper's central empirical finding is that the **core stages of regression testing remain stable**, but the mode of execution relies more heavily on **documentation, automation, and tool integration** to support asynchronous collaboration.
- The authors also claim that communication and coordination problems in remote/hybrid teams are mainly mitigated through **standardized reporting, shared repositories, and traceability mechanisms**, which in practice replace the informal on-site interactions that previously existed.
- The paper characterizes regression testing as a **socio-technical practice**: its effectiveness depends not only on testing techniques, but also on the fit between team collaboration and digital infrastructure.
- The paper **does not provide traditional quantitative performance metrics** (such as accuracy, percentage improvement in defect detection rate, or numerical comparisons with baseline tools); the strongest concrete results are mainly the sample size, the number of interviews and validation responses, and the qualitative findings above about stable processes but greater reliance on documentation, automation, and traceability mechanisms in execution.

## Link
- [http://arxiv.org/abs/2603.07419v1](http://arxiv.org/abs/2603.07419v1)