Empirical Research Plan: Effects of Sketching on Program Comprehension
  Sketching is an important means of communication in software engineering practice. Yet, there is little research investigating the use of sketches. We want to contribute a better understanding of sketching, in particular its use during program comprehension. We propose a controlled experiment to investigate the effectiveness and efficiency of program comprehension with the support of sketches as well as what sketches are used in what way. 
Sebastian Baltes and Stefan Wagner
cs.SE