Effectiveness of animation in trend visualization

George Robertson, Roland Fernandez, Danyel Fisher, Bongshin Lee, John Stasko

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

307 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Animation has been used to show trends in multi-dimensional data. This technique has recently gained new prominence for presentations, most notably with Gapminder Trendalyzer. In Trendalyzer, animation together with interesting data and an engaging presenter helps the audience understand the results of an analysis of the data. It is less clear whether trend animation is effective for analysis. This paper proposes two alternative trend visualizations that use static depictions of trends: one which shows traces of all trends overlaid simultaneously in one display and a second that uses a small multiples display to show the trend traces side-by-side. The paper evaluates the three visualizations for both analysis and presentation. Results indicate that trend animation can be challenging to use even for presentations; while it is the fastest technique for presentation and participants find it enjoyable and exciting, it does lead to many participant errors. Animation is the least effective form for analysis; both static depictions of trends are significantly faster than animation, and the small multiples display is more accurate.

Original languageEnglish
Article number4658146
Pages (from-to)1325-1332
Number of pages8
JournalIEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics
Volume14
Issue number6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2008 Nov

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Software
  • Signal Processing
  • Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
  • Computer Graphics and Computer-Aided Design

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