If done correctly, mapping and data visualization can be a powerful tool for sharing important information with the public. It works to help the general population better-understand topics that would otherwise be too complex to grasp.
Mapping and data visualization done incorrectly, however, is one of the most misleading and deadly sins of visual storytelling. An example of how much data visualization can mislead if done improperly are election maps. Commonly split between two colors: red (Republican) and blue (Democrat), these maps show which party each county in the United States voted for. What they don’t specify though, is that a region’s size can create a portion of color that misrepresents the results from that location.
In an article on the Harvard Business Review titled “Vision Statement: How to Lie with Charts,” the author uses the 2008 Obama vs McCain election as an example they call the “New York City Problem” because while that state only covers 0.01 percent of the area in the U.S, it’s only home to 2.7 percent of the population.
“About 80 percent of this map is red, but Republican candidate John McCain received only 40 percent of the vote.”
What the article suggests is to use maps to represent data that isn’t directly related to geography. An example would be overlaying maps with bubbles of representative sizes to create a more accurate depiction of non-spatial data. In doing so, you’re able to see that large— but sparsely populated counties— don’t take up the entire map and are now only small dots scattered across the map.
“When bubbles sized proportional to population are overlaid on the map, blue becomes more dominant.”
The goal of data visualization should be to depict a concept that is too difficult for words to articulate. Right now, the country is more divided than ever so political reporters and graphic designers should be working together to share the information as visually accurate as possible. It can’t be just one outlet, however. Every news platform and informed voter should do their part in learning the best way to read a political map and analyzing it in a way that’s accurate and beneficial for the larger population.
References:
Review, H. B. (2014, December 5). Vision Statement: How to Lie with Charts. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2014/12/vision-statement-how-to-lie-with-charts.
Wilson, M. (2020, November 5). U.S. election maps are wildly misleading, so this designer fixed them. Fast Company. https://www.fastcompany.com/90572489/u-s-election-maps-are-wildly-misleading-so-this-designer-fixed-them.