Discussion

Why do we need to understand data visualisations? There is more and more data around us, and data are increasingly used in decision-making, journalism, and to make sense of the world. One of the main ways that people get access to data is through visualisations, but lots of people feel like they don’t have the skills and knowledge to make sense of visualisations. This can mean that some people feel left out of conversations about data.” - http://seeingdata.org/developing-visualisation-literacy/

Please conduct the following activity located at the following address:

http://seeingdata.org/developing-visualisation-literacy/rate-these-visualisations/

Tell us what you think of the visualisations that we used in our focus group research. Instructions below!

What to do

1. Look at the visualisations by clicking on the images below. You can choose to open the visualisation in a NEW tab or window (we recommend this) or view it in a pop-up window if you prefer to stay on this page. Some are interactive (i) and some are static (s).
2. Place the images on the grid. When you’ve looked at one, go to the grid and position the image according to whether you liked or didn’t like and learned or didn’t learn something from the visualisation (‘learning something’ could also mean confirming something you already knew). Only place the visualisations that you have looked at onto the grid. Click SUBMIT.
3. Compare your views with others. You can compare your responses to the visualisations with those of others, by clicking COMPARE.

Choose three of your favorite visualisations. Post a 3 – 5 sentence summary of why you chose the visualisations. What caught your attention? Were they effective in presenting the provided data? If possible, explain how you would you do to improve the visualization?