The effects of normalization on end-user query errors: An experimental evaluation

As a result of the shortage of professional programmers to extract timely information from databases, end-users are increasingly developing their own database queries. Because end-user querying is error-prone, characterizing the sources of query errors and using that knowledge to improve the effectiveness of end-user query development can improve the quality of information used for decision making. This paper reports the results of an experiment that investigated the effect of normalization level on query errors. The results show that query errors vary with the normalization level of the database structure and confirm previous findings about query errors increasing with task complexity. End-users querying a first normal form data structure make fewer errors than end-users querying an unnormalized data structure or a third normal form data structure. Furthermore, end-users querying a third normal form data structure make fewer errors than end-users querying an unnormalized data structure.