Predicting Programmer Quotient

Abstract

Computing education necessitates programming skill. But it varies in students. How can we quantify or measure the skill? We are yet to have a standardized measurement system for the programming ability. The concept of Programmer Quotient (PQ), which gives a measure of innate programming ability, attributes a value to one's ability to program, just like Intelligence Quotient (IQ). This would remain the same independent of the programming experience. In this paper, we consider few inherent skills such as Analytical ability, ability to synthesize etc. and try to correlate these skills to one's programming ability. A questionnaire was designed and used to measure the skill in these areas. Then a model was designed from the data collected. It can predict the programming skills of a student from his/her inherent skills, irrespective of the programming language.