With the exercise on testing a version of ToDo app, any constraint handed to people as part of the assignment looks like it primes people to do worse.
If I give people a list of requirements, they stop at having verified the requirements, and reporting something they consider of value, without considering the completeness of their perspective or complementing constraints.
If I give people list of test cases or automation, they run those, and their entire judgement on the completeness is centered around whether those pass.
If I give them the application without a constraint, they end up constrained with whatever people before me have asked them to do in the name of testing. All too often, it's the ask for "requirements", as a source of someone else constraint for their task at hand.
When seeing that this year I would hand out the requirements, the feedback from a colleague was that this would make the task easier. It made it harder, I think. What I find most fascinating though is why would people think this makes it easier when it creates an incorrect illusion of a criteria to stop at. Another colleague said they vary what they do first, with or without the requirements, but they will do both. That is hard-earned experience people don't come with when they graduate.
