When people in the software world talk about test engineers, a familiar stereotype immediately comes to mind:“The entry-level role for engineers who don’t really like coding.”
This line was repeated so often that many became convinced the job was merely a simple technical position. But the reality is more layered. As a test engineer with a sociology background, I’ve noticed some parallels between the two fields. It may sound odd at first, but the comparison holds up better than you’d expect.
Sociologists analyze behaviors, relationships, and the hidden dynamics of society. Test engineers examine the “society” of software—its users. We try to understand their behaviors, habits, expectations, and especially the unexpected failures that emerge in real-world interactions. What both professions share is this: the surface level is never enough. It’s not just “The screen opens.” The real questions are: “Why does it open like this? What is the user thinking here? Which behavioral pattern does this flow run into?”
What sociology calls “invisible labor” has a near-perfect equivalent in testing.
Now, why does this field align so naturally with sociology graduates? On paper, test engineering is a technical role. In practice, it’s far more complex. Knowing business rules isn’t enough. The target user is one thing; the actual user is another. Team decisions influence how the product will be used and which behavioral patterns will be triggered. All of this requires analytical thinking, sharp observation, and intuition—skills you won’t gain solely from a technical education. In other words, asking “Do you know how to code?” doesn’t come close to explaining the full picture.
There’s another long-told story in the industry: test engineering was once viewed as an “entry-level job.” You still hear comments about engineers who weren’t comfortable with coding choosing the testing side. Whether these narratives are accurate is debatable, but their very existence is enough to shadow the role’s prestige. Eventually, the belief takes root:“Testing? Eh, that’s where you start… you won’t really grow from there.”
Then things change—unexpectedly. People from outside the traditional engineering track enter the field. Those without formal technical training but with strong analytical thinking, an eye for detail, and a feel for user behavior begin working as test engineers, and the atmosphere shifts—at least in some teams. Especially in manual testing, the quality noticeably rises. Because although testing sounds simple, it actually requires a particular mindset; technical skills can be learned later, but thinking skills can’t be reshaped as easily.
Of course, this shift brings a new misconception.
If non-engineers can succeed, then it must be easy (!).
The validity of this assumption is questionable, but the fact that it’s voiced is undeniable.
This fluctuating perception keeps test engineering in a gray zone for years. First it’s undervalued. Then the field gets filled with underqualified profiles and genuinely starts to look unimportant. Later, contributions from non-technical professionals raise the bar. Then a new “Oh, it must be easy” narrative appears. In short, it becomes a full sociological case study.
And through all of this, one fact remains: technical knowledge is more accessible than ever. AI, endless documentation, ready-made frameworks… the technical barrier has probably never been lower.
But the hard part isn’t the technical side.
The hard part is analysis.
The hard part is reading behavior.
The hard part is truly understanding the user.
The hard part is sensing where the system will break.
The hard part is asking,
“This works—but why does it work this way?”
This is why testing isn’t simply “I clicked the button, it worked.” Testing often requires a sociological reading: predicting user behavior, interpreting the consequences of team decisions, and evaluating the system holistically. In these ways, testing demands far more than technical know-how.
And now, the conclusion. Comparing test engineers to sociologists isn’t just a metaphor; it’s a reminder that software is used by humans. A product’s fate is often determined not by its code, but by human behavior. So the openness of the field to “non-technical” people doesn’t stem from its simplicity but from its multidimensional nature. Technical skills can be taught; perspective is harder to cultivate.
That’s why test engineering, much like sociology, is far deeper than it looks. And let’s be honest: the industry still hasn’t fully realized that.