An empirical study of question discussions on Stack Overflow

Stack Overflow provides a means for developers to exchange knowledge. While much previous research on Stack Overflow has focused on questions and answers (QA the likelihood of their participation increases as the number of comments increases. (3) There is a strong correlation between the number of question comments and the question answering time (i.e., more discussed questions receive answers more slowly); also, questions with a small number of comments are likely to be answered more quickly than questions with no discussion. Our findings suggest that question discussions contain a rich trove of data that is integral to the Q&A processes on Stack Overflow. We further suggest how future research can leverage the information in question discussions, along with the commonly studied Q&A information.