Landscaping Systematic Mapping Studies in Software Engineering: A Tertiary Study

Context: A number of Systematic Mapping Studies (SMSs) that cover Software Engineering (SE) are reported in literature. Tertiary studies synthesize the secondary studies to provide a holistic view of an area. Objectives: We synthesize SMSs in SE to provide insights into existing SE areas and to investigate the trends and quality of SMSs. Methodology: We use Systematic Literature Review protocol to analyze and map the SMSs in SE, till August 2017, to SE Body of Knowledge (SWEBOK). Results: We analyze 210 SMSs and results show that: (1) Software design and construction are most active areas in SE; (2) Some areas lack SMSs, including mathematical foundations, software configuration management, and SE tools; (3) The quality of SMSs is improving with time; (4) SMSs in journals have higher quality than SMSs in conferences and are cited more often; (5) Low quality in SMSs can be attributed to a lack of quality assessment in SMSs and not reporting information about the primary studies. Conclusion: There is a potential for more SMSs in some SE areas. A number of SMSs do not provide the required information for an SMS, which leads to a low quality score.