Simple techniques for bridging the graphics language gap

Alan Smith:

As the Pew research suggests, education is important. In most countries, while students of particular subjects — for example, economics, mathematics or science — may spend time developing chart-making and chart-reading skills, there is no educational strategy for ensuring everyone does.

Even many of those who develop chart literacy suffer an inverse problem: most of the professional statisticians and economists I have worked with have never received any formal academic training on how to present complex information to non-expert audiences. Entire organisations can suffer from this two-way skills gap: researchers and policy analysts often find it difficult to communicate effectively with leaders, even if they are in acute need of support.