Appealing Chart or Engaging Chart?: An Analysis

This area chart illustrates the proportion of every generation in the US Congress from the year 1920 to 2020. Despite being visually pleasing, informative, and interactive from the first look, this chart can confuse its viewers with convoluted details and unclear size assessment.  

The chart stands out with its creative layout. There is a selection of clearly distinguished colours that help users to easily differentiate the data subjects. Each generation has its share properly drawn in the chart. This complicated dataset is arranged quite neatly in only one visualization, which makes the chart comprehensive and time-saving for its users. 

The captivating illustration, however, does not so succeed in its required function. It is packed with too many details, such as different colours, shapes, and a long time range. Such attributes overwhelm the viewers with a huge amount of information to process. Questions then arise. Should the users focus on the size of each colour? Or should they focus on the span of them through time? It takes the users much time to figure out how to interpret the data when they first interact with it. 

Though the purpose of this visualization is to highlight the proportion of baby boomers in the US Congress nowadays (as it shows in the headline), this core generation only makes up a smaller portion on the right side of the chart. The rest of the chart only seems distracting and redundant. To better present the data, the creator could turn this visualization into a line chart, which is mostly used to compare data over a time range. 


The chart does a rather good job of showing the size of each generation. However, when it comes to comparison, it is hard to see the difference among generations at a specific time period. The hovering feature supports access to extended information on the chart. Such information is hidden from the start, though it is the essential data the users need to understand the dataset. 

The efficiency of the hovering feature is not as good as it seems. This feature lacks continuity when the users jump from one area to another to see the share of Congress members in a particular year. The vertical line only shows the information of that particular area, which does not have any comparison value. It is better to have the hovering feature showing data of every generation in the year chosen. 

As appealing and creative as the data visualization is, it still need some improvement to do.  

Link to the chart: 

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/aging-congress-boomers/

Comments

  1. AnonymousJanuary 26, 2024 at 12:23 PM

    Hi Leslie, this is an interesting chart, I've never seen one like this before. I do agree one of its major faults is how hard it is to see which categories are larger than the other. The colours are nice and contrasting against the other which is nice to differentiate the birth ranges.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Julie Diels-NeufeldJanuary 29, 2024 at 6:17 PM

    The chart does stand out because of how colourful it is, and then immediately confused me while trying to interpret it. I appreciate that you very clearly identified this as an issue with this data visualization, and I agree that a line chart would be a much better option. I also like that you really dug into how challenging interactive features can be, more often than not, I find them to be more trouble than they are worth!

    One small suggestion: when linking to the original source, embedding the link into the text of your written analysis would be a bit more polished.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yushan PanJanuary 29, 2024 at 9:13 PM

    This chart's visually pleasing and informative aspects, such as the use of clear colors and the comprehensive representation of complex data. However, your critique of the chart's potential to confuse viewers due to its intricate details and unclear size assessment is valid.And I agree your suggest transform the visualization into a line chart to better present the data .Well done!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Data Update 2: What Have Been So Far?

1. The Lead:  Up to 30% of the 2SLGBTQ+ community in Canada rate their mental health as below par, compared to 9% of non-2SLGBTQ+ people, according to Statistics Canada.  2. The Excel Workbook  3. Explanation:  The workbook contains two sheets, which are Raw Data and Slice. In Slice, there are 3 columns and 5 rows. The spreadsheet showcases the proportions of 2SLGBTQ+ people and non-2SLGBTQ+ people who evaluate their mental health according to 2 levels: good, very good, or excellent (good and above par), and fair or poor (below par). The values are proportions shown in percentage. They are calculated within the population of either demographic group. For example, 70.3% of the 2SLGBTQ+ community across Canada perceive their mental health as good, very good, or excellent, and the rest of them (29.7%) rate their mental health as fair or poor.  I chose to find the answer to this question because the feedback from Update 1 showed me how looking at data across Canada ...
Read more

Neighbourhood Profile: A Diverse Community

Image
Postal Code : V3V 1K8  Census Tract : 9330186.08 Total Population : 6,604 Neighbourhood Description : A part of Surrey Centre that spans across 126th Street to King George Boulevard.  1. A "Packed" Neighbourhood.  With only 6,604 residents, the population density of this neighbourhood reached 5,067.5 people per square kilometre in 2021, compared to the modest number of 918 residents per square kilometre of the Vancouver CMA.  This number represents the new surging flow of immigrants welcomed to the region in recent years. Furthermore, the crowded population reflects its location in downtown Surrey.  2. A Major "Minority" Neighbourhood 82.5% of the total population of this Census Tract are visible minorities making it one of the most diverse communities across the CMA. Such a proportion makes the decent rate, 54.5%, of Vancouver CMA pale in comparison.  The residents of this neighbourhood consist of mainly South Asian people. This is not a surprise as t...
Read more