CSE 442 - Data Visualization

Graphical Perception

Jeffrey Heer University of Washington

Design Principles [Mackinlay 86]

Expressiveness
A set of facts is expressible in a visual language if
the sentences (i.e. the visualizations) in the
language express all the facts in the set of data,
and only the facts in the data.

Effectiveness
A visualization is more effective than another
visualization if the information conveyed by one
visualization is more readily perceived than the
information in the other visualization.
Design Principles Translated

Tell the truth and nothing but the truth

(don’t lie, and don’t lie by omission)

Use encodings that people decode better

(where better = faster and/or more accurate)
Effectiveness Rankings [Mackinlay 86]
QUANTITATIVE ORDINAL NOMINAL
Position Position Position
Length Density (Value) Color Hue
Angle Color Sat Texture
Slope Color Hue Connection
Area (Size) Texture Containment
Volume Connection Density (Value)
Density (Value) Containment Color Sat
Color Sat Length Shape
Color Hue Angle Length
Texture Slope Angle
Connection Area (Size) Slope
Containment Volume Area
Shape Shape Volume
Graphical Perception
The ability of viewers to interpret visual
(graphical) encodings of information and
thereby decode information in graphs.
Topics
Signal Detection
Magnitude Estimation
Using Multiple Visual Encodings
Pre-Attentive Processing
Gestalt Grouping
Change Blindness
Signal Detection
Detecting Brightness

L R

Which is brighter?
Detecting Brightness

(128, 128, 128) (144, 144, 144)

Which is brighter?
Detecting Brightness

L R

Which is brighter?
Detecting Brightness

(134, 134, 134) (128, 128, 128)

Which is brighter?
Just Noticeable Difference (JND)
Scale Factor
(Empirically Determined)
JND (Weber’s Law)
Change of
Perceived Intensity
Change
Physical
Intensity
Ratios more important than magnitude
Most continuous variation in stimuli are
perceived in discrete steps
Encoding Data with Color
Value is perceived as ordered
∴ Encode ordinal variables (O)

∴ Encode continuous variables (Q) [not as well]

Hue is normally perceived as unordered

∴ Encode nominal variables (N) using color
Steps in Font Size
Sizes standardized in 16th century

a a a a a a a

6 7 8 9 10 11 12 14 16 18
a a a a
21
a
24
a
36
a
48
a
60
a
72
Magnitude Estimation
A Quick Experiment…
Compare area of circles
Compare length of bars
Compare area of circles
Compare length of bars
 Steven’s Power Law
Exponent
(Empirically Determined)

Perceived Physical
Sensation Intensity

Predicts bias, not

necessarily accuracy!

[Graph from Wilkinson ’99, based on Stevens ’61]

Exponents of Power Law
Sensation Exponent
Loudness 0.6
Brightness 0.33
Smell 0.55 (Coffee) - 0.6 (Heptane)
Taste 0.6 (Saccharine) -1.3 (Salt)
Temperature 1.0 (Cold) – 1.6 (Warm)
Vibration 0.6 (250 Hz) – 0.95 (60 Hz)
Duration 1.1
Pressure 1.1
Heaviness 1.45
Electic Shock 3.5

[Psychophysics of Sensory Function, Stevens ’61]

Apparent Magnitude Scaling

[Cartography: Thematic Map Design, Figure 8.6, p. 170, Dent, ’96]

S = 0.98A0.87 [from Flannery ’71]
Graphical Perception [Cleveland & McGill 84]
Cleveland & McGill, ‘84
 Position 1
Position 2
Position 3
Length 1
Length 2
Angle
Area (Circular)
Area (Rect 1)
Area (Rect 2)

Heer & Bostock ‘10 Log Absolute Estimation Error

Graphical Perception Experiments

Empirical estimates of encoding effectiveness
Relative Magnitude Comparison
Most accurate Position (common) scale
Position (non-aligned) scale

Length

Slope

Angle

Area

Volume

Least accurate Color hue-saturation-density

Effectiveness Rankings [Mackinlay 86]
QUANTITATIVE ORDINAL NOMINAL
Position Position Position
Length Density (Value) Color Hue
Angle Color Sat Texture
Slope Color Hue Connection
Area (Size) Texture Containment
Volume Connection Density (Value)
Density (Value) Containment Color Sat
Color Sat Length Shape
Color Hue Angle Length
Texture Slope Angle
Connection Area (Size) Slope
Containment Volume Area
Shape Shape Volume
Multiple Attributes
One-Dimensional: Lightness

White White

White Black

Black Black

White White

Black White
One-Dimensional: Shape

Square Circle

Circle Circle

Circle Square

Square Circle

Circle Circle
Redundant: Shape & Lightness

Circle Circle

Square Square

Square Square

Circle Square

Square Circle
Orthogonal: Shape & Lightness

Circle

Square

Square

Circle

Square
 Speeded Classi cation
Redundancy Gain
Facilitation in reading one dimension when the
other provides redundant information

Filtering Interference
Dif culty in ignoring one dimension while
attending to the other
fi
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Speeded Classi cation
Response Time

Interference

Gain

R 1 O R 1 O
Lightness Shape

Dimension Classi ed
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 Types of Perceptual Dimensions
Integral
Filtering interference and redundancy gain
Separable
No interference or gain
Asymmetric
One dim separable from other, not vice versa
Example: The Stroop effect – color naming is
in uenced by word identity, but word naming
is not in uenced by color
fl
fl
Stroop Effect: What word?

blue
yellow
red
orange
green
purple
Stroop Effect: What color?

blue
yellow
red
orange
green
purple
Size and Brightness

W. S. Dobson, Visual information processing and cartographic communication: The role

of redundant stimulus dimensions, 1983 (reprinted in MacEachren, 1995)
Orientation & Size

How well can you see temperature or precipitation?

Is there a correlation between the two?
[MacEachren 95]
Length & Length

[MacEachren 95]
Angle & Angle

[MacEachren 95]
Summary of Integral & Separable
Integral

[Figure 5.25,
Color Plate 10,
Ware 2000] Separable
Set
Each card has 4 features:
Color
Symbol
Number
Shading/Texture

A set consists of 3 cards

in which each feature is
the SAME or DIFFERENT
on each card.
Pre-Attentive Processing
How Many 3’s?

1281768756138976546984506985604982826762
9809858458224509856458945098450980943585
9091030209905959595772564675050678904567
8845789809821677654876364908560912949686

[based on a slide from J. Stasko]

How Many 3’s?

1281768756138976546984506985604982826762
9809858458224509856458945098450980943585
9091030209905959595772564675050678904567
8845789809821677654876364908560912949686

[based on a slide from J. Stasko]

Visual Pop-Out: Color

http://www.csc.ncsu.edu/faculty/healey/PP/index.html
Visual Pop-Out: Shape

http://www.csc.ncsu.edu/faculty/healey/PP/index.html
Feature Conjunctions

http://www.csc.ncsu.edu/faculty/healey/PP/index.html
Pre-Attentive Features

[Information Visualization.
Figure 5. 5 Ware 04]
More Pre-Attentive Features
Line (blob) orientation Julesz & Bergen [1983]; Wolfe et al. [1992]
Length Treisman & Gormican [1988]
Width Julesz [1985]
Size Treisman & Gelade [1980]
Curvature Treisman & Gormican [1988]
Number Julesz [1985]; Trick & Pylyshyn [1994]
Terminators Julesz & Bergen [1983]
Intersection Julesz & Bergen [1983]
Closure Enns [1986]; Treisman & Souther [1985]
Colour (hue) Nagy & Sanchez [1990, 1992];
D'Zmura [1991]; Kawai et al. [1995];
Bauer et al. [1996]
Intensity Beck et al. [1983];
Treisman & Gormican [1988]
Flicker Julesz [1971]
Direction of motion Nakayama & Silverman [1986];
Driver & McLeod [1992]
Binocular lustre Wolfe & Franzel [1988]
Stereoscopic depth Nakayama & Silverman [1986]
3-D depth cues Enns [1990]
Lighting direction Enns [1990]
Pre-Attentive Conjunctions
Spatial conjunctions are often pre-attentive
Motion and 3D disparity
Motion and color
Motion and shape
3D disparity and color
3D disparity and shape

But most conjunctions are NOT pre-attentive

Feature Integration Theory

Feature maps for

orientation & color [Green]

Treisman’s feature integration model [Healey 04]

Administrivia
Final Project

Produce an explorable visual explanation

Initial prototype and design review
Final deliverables and video presentation
Submit and publish online (GitHub)
Projects from previous classes have been:
! Published as research papers
! Shared widely (some in the New York Times!)
! Released as successful open source projects
Final Project Schedule
Proposal Fri Nov 12
Milestone Tue Nov 23
Demo Video Wed Dec 8
Video Showcase Thu Dec 9 (in class)
Deliverables Tue Dec 14

Logistics
Final project description posted online
Work in groups of up to 4 people
Start determining your project topic!
Milestone Prototype
Publish work to GitHub pages for us to examine
and share feedback. You are not expected to have
complete, polished content at this point.
You are expected to provide prototype work that
communicates your design goals. For example:
initial visualizations, sketches, storyboards, and text
annotations / idea descriptions.
We should get a sense of what you intend to
ultimately submit! Also feel free to ask us questions.
Gestalt Grouping
Gestalt Principles
Figure/Ground
Proximity
Similarity
Symmetry
Connectedness
Continuity
Closure
Common Fate
Transparency
Figure/Ground

Principle of surroundedness

Principle of relative size

Ambiguous

http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Modules/MC10220/visper07.html
Figure/Ground

Ambiguous Unambiguous (?)

http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Modules/MC10220/visper07.html
Proximity

[Ware ’00]
Similarity

Rows dominate due to similarity [from Ware ’04]

Symmetry

Bilateral symmetry gives strong sense of gure [from Ware ’04]

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Connectedness

Connectedness overrules proximity, size, color shape [from Ware ’04]

Continuity

We prefer smooth not abrupt changes [from Ware ’04]

Connections are clearer with smooth contours [from Ware ’04]

Continuity: Vector Fields

Prefer eld that shows smooth continuous contours [from Ware 04]
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Continuity: Vector Fields

Prefer eld that shows smooth continuous contours [from Ware ’04]
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Closure

We see a circle behind a rectangle, not a broken circle [from Ware ’04]

Illusory contours [from Durand ’02]

Common Fate

Dots moving together are grouped

Transparency
Requires continuity and proper color
correspondence [from Ware ’04]
Change Blindness
Change Blindness
Change Blindness
Change Blindness
Change Blindness
Change Blindness

[Example from Palmer 99, originally due to Rock]

Demonstrations
http://www.psych.ubc.ca/~rensink/ icker/download/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ahg6qcgoay4

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Summary
Choosing effective visual encodings requires
knowledge of visual perception.

Visual features/attributes
Individual attributes often pre-attentive
Multiple attributes may be separable or integral

Gestalt principles provide high-level guidelines

We don’t always see everything that is there!