Yiyang Shi

Visualization Critique:

I would like to critique the Employment Candidate Review example at the very beginning of the reading. I would like to critique the graph in two areas, the representation of the three candidates and the value encoding means. According to Few, any information that is not conveying important meanings should be eliminated. However, in the candidate review graph, the designer used three ways to convey the same information, the representation of the three candidates. For each candidate, a distinctive color and a distinctive symbol are assigned. The designer even used dashes to link Jack Nymbul’s rates. Those are redundant information that may cause confusion.

According to Few, bars are powerful in emphasizing individual values as well as in comparing values. In the candidate review graph, although the ratings on each competence are easy to compare, it is not easy for the views to compare the values across the six competences. A better way of presenting the ratings among the six competences for the candidates would be to use bar charts where a different color is assigned to each competence.

Also, according to the graph, it seems like the designer is trying to say that the larger the polygon, the better the candidate. If that is the case, then it is an unsuccessful visualization because people’s ability to accurately compare 2-D areas is not well developed. Bars showing the sum of the ratings for each candidate would be clearer.

Quiz:

- I have neither given nor received aid while working on this assignment. I have completed the graded portion BEFORE looking at anyone else's work on this assignment. Yiyang Shi -