the functional art: design and infographics | journalism interactive conference 2013 |...

A Functional Art

40%

45%

35%

30%

25%

20%

15%

DC

MA

CO

MS

WV

NHMD

NJCTVT

VI

MN

CA

UTNYKSWA

MOAZGAILRI

DEHI

INKY

MS

AR

WV

AKWIORFL

MTSDPA

NDNMSCNEOHNVTXMIIA

TNMEID

NCOKWYLAAL

NC

SDDE ND

MDNEMEORFLIDWIVA

WYNH

WARI

NM

MNAKAZCANYNJVTMAMTHICTUTNVDC

CO

SCKYLATXMITNMOOKAR

GAINKSOHPAIAIL

Population with aBA degree or higher

Percentage ofobese people

AL

States with a largerpercentage of people withhigher education thanwith obesity

States with a largerpercentage of obese peoplethan of people witha higher education

US average27.2% BA or higher27.0% Obese

how to embrace and teach infographics and visualization

Alberto CairoUniversity of Miami

www.thefunctionalart.comTwitter: @albertocairo

http://www.thefunctionalart.com


An infographic is a visual representation of evidence, a tool for analysis, communication, and understanding

Two partsEvidenceRepresentation

Throughout the years I’ve become concerned about the way we teach what evidence is in J-Schools

http://ilovecharts.tumblr.com/

“How silly. I’d never fall for that one!”



Homeopathy, autism and vaccines... We bite baits too easily

“It got worse after the zero-alcohol law was approved. Deaths in car accidents have not stopped growing!”

Deaths per100.000 vehicles!

“Our world is not about ideology anymore. It’s about complexity”

Matt Taibbi, Griftopia

Are we teaching students and learn ourselves how to deal with that complexity?

Moreover...We talk a lot about storytelling, but are we really sure that we understand what the challenges and limits of storytelling may be?Do we teach them to our students?

I am a journalist and a designer: Storytelling is part of my life

AVERAGE +9.4%

DIAGRAMNEWS IN PERSPECTIVE

How Brazil can take advantageof a future with fewer childrenper couple.

Brazil’sDemographicOpportunity

Alberto Cairo, Francine Lima,Marco Vergotti

2000

1950

250 million people

2010 190,732,694169.799.170

AP

RR

AC

DF

PA

AM

TO

MT

GO

MS

SC

SE

MA

RN

RO

CE

AL

ES

PB

PI

PE

SP

PR

MG

RJ

BA

RS

648,553

425,398

707,125

2,469,489

7,443,904

3,350,773

1,373,551

2,954,625

5,849,105

2,404,256

6,178,603

2,036,277

6,424,340

3,121,451

1,535,625

8,180,087

3,093,994

3,392,775

3,753,633

3,086,448

8,541,250

39,924,091

10,266,737

19,159,260

15,180,636

13,633,969

10,576,758

477,032

324,397

557,526

2,051,146

6,192,307

2,812,557

1,157,098

2,504,353

5,003,228

2,078,001

5,356,360

1,784,475

5,651,475

2,776,782

1,379,787

7,430,661

2,822,621

3,097,232

3,443,825

2,843,278

7,918,344

37,032,403

9,563,458

17,891,494

14,391,282

13,070,250

10,187,798

Change36.0%

31.1%

26.8%

20.4%

19.1%

18.7%

18.0%

16.9%

15.7%

15.4%

14.1%

13.7%

12.4%

11.3%

10.1%

9.6%

9.5%

9.0%

8.6%

7.9%

7.8%

7.4%

7.1%

5.5%

4.3%

3.8%

20.2%

BRAZIL’S POPULATION IS BIGGER

2000 2010

—BUT THE FERTILITY RATE IS MUCH LOWER THAN EXPECTED AS A CONSEQUENCE, POPULATION WILL STOP GROWING—

2030 2040 2050

125

0

—AND IT WILL BECOME OLDER

Forecast for 20502005

Men Women

2 1 0 1 2

75 years

50

30

20

65

Belowaverage

1

2 3

4

-9,4%

-0,1%

+9.4%

+0.1%Below

AboveAverage

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

NIGERIA

CHINA

África

Europe

BRAZIL

AustraliaAsiaLatin AmericaNorth America

Millions of people per age group

No dataavailable

Years

POPULATION CHANGE

PRELIMINARY DATA FROM THE 2010 CENSUScreate an interesting picture of the changesthat the Brazilian population has gone throughin the past ten years. Brazil’s populationgrew, on average, 10% between 2000 and2010, but the fertility rate is below 2.1 childrenper woman, the minimum to keep apopulation from shrinking. According toCésar Marques, a demographer from theUniversity of Campinas, the main challengeBrazil will face in the future is how to maintaina healthy Social Security system if thenumber of older and retired people willlikely be much larger than it is today.Read on to learn about all the variables at playin this story.

(Data updated on November 4, 2010)The map shows the change in population

in Brazilian municipalities. Between2000 and 2010, 1,630 cities and towns,

from a total of 5,506, lost population. RioGrande do Sul is the state with a the largest

number of municipalities that lost inhabitants,due to a significant drop in fertility rates

and domestic migration

Aboveaverage

The 2010 Census has revealed a 9.4%population increase between2000 and 2010. The differences betweenstates, as you can see on the charton the right, are noticeable. Most richstates, such as São Paulo and Rio, didn’tgrow as fast as the ones in the north east.

Sources: IBGE, UN, World Bank, César Marques (UNICAMP)

How Brazil can transform the population challenge into an opportunity

As the population ages, the proportion of people of working age increases.The country will therefore have more people producing wealth (if the labormarket can absorb them) and fewer children to consume investments. It is awindow of opportunity, because in some cases the number of people ofworking age to fall back when older people are leaving the market.

The population under 15 years of age is falling today. A smaller number ofstudent in public schools will facilitate the quality of teaching, if the amountinvested in education stays the same.

Educational policy focused on low-income youth favors the formation of moreskilled workforce and greater social mobility.

In the future, Brazil will reach the stage of Europe and Japan, which struggleto support their elders. This is why it’s so important to prepare a more balanced retirement system, which will include retirement at a later age.

Each linerepresentsa country

or continent

A study in 2004 estimated that in 2010, the fertility rate would be 2.4 childrenper woman, on average. But new data collected by the IBGE prove thatthe fertility rate is already 1.9, below the threshold called “replacement rate”.When the fertility rate drops below this number, the population of a countrywill eventually start to shrink and grow older.

Forecasts made in 2004 anticipated that Brazil’s populationwould stop growing in 2040. But the most recent data fromthe IBGE suggests that this could happen much earler, in 2030.

New populationpeak: momentwhen populationwill stop growing

Former populationpeak (calculatedin 2004)

YEMEN

WORLDAVERAGE

INDIA

Number of childrenper woman

Replacementlevel: average of2.1 children per woman

Comparing the currentpopulation pyramid with theone predicted for 2050

But many distrust storytelling for very good reasons...

“Power”, “Impact”, “Captivate”, “Convince”, “Inspire”, “Persuade”, “Connect”...

You may say that these are secondary values for journalists but are you really sure about that?

The human brain tends to impose linear patterns to non-linear phenomena to make sense of them

This can lead to “narrative fallacies”:Seeing connections and causation where there’s none;oversimplification of complex phenomena. Journalists are not aware of brain bugs and biases, in general

I don’t even need to remind you of this, right?

Many said that the main sin Lehrer committed was to make up quotes, but the main problem was not that: His books impose cohesive narrative structures to disperse bits of evidence

But we cannot avoid stories: The serial structure of stories matches the serial dynamics of the thinking mind

In part, we like stories because we create stories in our heads to make sense of the world

Perhaps we need to rethink how we teach storytelling at J-School and the scientific method in research classes: Less theory and abstraction; less “follow your instincts” BS. Make statistics and qualitative methods fun and exciting, and learn about cognitive biases and shortcomings

Two partsEvidenceRepresentation

Look for “Best Infographics”in Google and you’ll find things like this

No structure

No context

It is not a visual representation, but a simple layout with a bunch of unrelated numbers.

Look for “Best Infographics”in Google and you’ll find things like this

An infographic (or visualization) should not be just a pretty picture but a structured, accurate visual presentation of evidence

Graphics and glasses:With no glasses, the world looks like noise to me;with glasses, chaos becomes signal

A graphic is a tool. In a very literal sense:It extends our visual brain, it lets us see beyond what we would normally see, the same way a

hammer makes us literally stronger

Before you even switch the computer on, ask yourself what are the questions that readers most likely will want to have answered. Or what tasks your graphic should help readers with

Choose graphic forms accordingly

Function doesn’t dictate form, but function does restrict the variety of forms it is acceptable to use for each story and set of data(choosing forms is not a matter of personal taste only)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/interactive/2012/sep/12/us-poverty-map-2011-census

The Guardian







How much you would save if federal income taxes were reduced 20%

Average

tax change

Income

Quintile

First(Lowest)

SOURCE: The New York Times GRAPHIC: ACME

Second Third Fourth Fifth(Top)

-$10 -$192 -$706 -$1,679 -$7,762


Average

tax change

Income

Quintile

First(Lowest)



-$10 -$192 -$706 -$1,679 -$7,762?


Average

tax change

Income

Quintile

First(Lowest)



-$10 -$192 -$706 -$1,679 -$7,762


Average

tax change

Income

Quintile

First(Lowest)



-$10 -$192 -$706 -$1,679 -$7,762

-$10

-$192

-$706

-$1,679

-$7,762


Average tax changeIncome Quintile

First(Lowest)


Second

Third

Fourth

Fifth(Top)

Infographics should not be used to simplify stories, but to clarify them

USA Today

First one is to accept that a graphic is a tool for understanding and get used to critically analyzing published examples

Three steps to become a visualization/infographics designer

“Obesity is, on average, inversely proportional to the average education of the population”

Second step is to start making simple graphics about topics you care about. Tons of them.

Percentage with aBA degree or higher


This doesn’t work...

Percentage with a

BA degree or higher

Percentage of

obese people

Lower Higher Lower Higher

This is a little bit better, but not much...

District of Columbia Massachusetts Colorado New Hampshire Maryland New Jersey Connecticut Vermont Virginia Minnesota California Utah New York Kansas Washington Missouri Arizona Georgia Illinois Rhode Island US AVERAGE Delaware Hawaii Florida Oregon Wisconsin Alaska Montana South Dakota Pennsylvania North Dakota New Mexico South Carolina Nebraska Ohio Nevada Texas Michigan Iowa Tennessee Maine Idaho North Carolina Oklahoma Wyoming Louisiana Alabama Indiana Kentucky Mississippi Arkansas West Virginia

45.736.735.535.435.234.634.534.233.132.531.730.830.630

29.928.128

27.627.427.227.226.926.626

25.925.625.525.525.525.325.225.124.924.824.624.524.524.424.324.324.223.823.422.922.522.422.321.121

20.118.815.3

Percentage with aBA degree or higher


MississippiWest VirginiaAlabamaSouth CarolinaKentuckyLouisianaTexasMichiganTennesseeMissouriOklahomaArkansasGeorgiaIndianaKansasOhioPennsylvaniaIowaIllinoisDelawareNorth CarolinaSouth DakotaNorth DakotaMarylandUS AVERAGENebraskaMaineOregonFloridaIdahoWisconsinVirginiaRhode IslandWashingtonNew MexicoWyomingNew HampshireMinnesotaAlaskaArizonaCaliforniaNew YorkNew JerseyVermontMassachusettsMontanaHawaiiConnecticutUtahNevadaDistrict of ColumbiaColorado

3432.532.231.531.33131

30.930.830.530.430.129.629.629.429.228.628.428.228

27.827.327.227.127.026.926.826.826.626.526.326

25.525.525.125.125

24.824.524.324

23.923.823.22323

22.722.522.522.422.221

0 50 100 0 50 100

2010

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36

Percentage

of people with

a BA degree

or higher

Percentage of obese people

US obesity average: 27%

People with a BA,US average: 27.2%

DC

WV

COMD

WY

AR

40%

45%

35%

30%

25%

20%

15%

DC

MA

CO

MS

WV

NHMD

NJCTVT

VI

MN

CA

UTNYKSWA

MOAZGAILRI

DEHI

INKY

MS

AR

WV

AKWIORFL

MTSDPA

NDNMSCNEOHNVTXMIIA

TNMEID

NCOKWYLAAL

NC

SDDE ND

MDNEMEORFLIDWIVA

WYNH

WARI

NM


CO

SCKYLATXMITNMOOKAR

GAINKSOHPAIAIL



AL




Slopegraph

40%

45%

35%

30%

25%

20%

15%

DC

MA

CO

MS

WV

NHMD

NJCTVT

VI

MN

CA

UTNYKSWA

MOAZGAILRI

DEHI

INKY

MS

AR

WV

AKWI

ORFL

MTSDPA

NDNMSCNEOHNVTXMIIA

TNMEID

NCOKWYLAAL

NC

SDDE ND

MDNEMEORFLIDWIVA

WYNH

WARI

NM


CO

SCKYLATXMITNMOOKAR

GAINKSOHPAIAIL



AL




40%

45%

35%

30%

25%

20%

15%

DC

MA

CO

MS

WV

NHMD

NJCTVT

VI

MN

CA

UTNYKSWA

MOAZGAILRI

DEHI

INKY

MS

AR

WV

AKWIORFL

MTSDPA

NDNMSCNEOHNVTXMIIA

TNMEID

NCOKWYLAAL

NC

SDDE ND

MDNEMEORFLIDWIVA

WYNH

WARI

NM


CO

SCKYLATXMITNMOOKAR

GAINKSOHPAIAIL



AL




ENEM test

Third step is to educate yourself in creating hierarchies, narratives, stories, etc., that make your presentations understandable and useful. Don’t just throw data at readers

http://revistaepoca.globo.com/diagrama/noticia/2011/09/confira-media-e-o-ranking-das-escolas-na-prova-do-enem-2010.html



Show me what I’d not be able to see otherwise

Thank you!Alberto Cairo

University of Miamiwww.thefunctionalart.com

Twitter: @albertocairo

40%

45%

35%

30%

25%

20%

15%

DC

MA

CO

MS

WV

NHMD

NJCTVT

VI

MN

CA

UTNYKSWA

MOAZGAILRI

DEHI

INKY

MS

AR

WV

AKWIORFL

MTSDPA

NDNMSCNEOHNVTXMIIA

TNMEID

NCOKWYLAAL

NC

SDDE ND

MDNEMEORFLIDWIVA

WYNH

WARI

NM


CO

SCKYLATXMITNMOOKAR

GAINKSOHPAIAIL



AL






the functional art: design and infographics | journalism interactive conference 2013 |...

Documents

population change

brazilian population

lost population

population pyramid

frica population

average1 brazils population

new data

fertility rates