Cited by 682Data Visualization and AnalyticsRisk Perception and ManagementClimate Change Communication and Perception

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Visualizing Uncertainty About the Future

Spiegelhalter, David, Pearson, Mike, Short, Ian·2011·Science

DOI 10.1126/science.1191181

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Abstract

We are all faced with uncertainty about the future, but we can get the measure of some uncertainties in terms of probabilities. Probabilities are notoriously difficult to communicate effectively to lay audiences, and in this review we examine current practice for communicating uncertainties visually, using examples drawn from sport, weather, climate, health, economics, and politics. Despite the burgeoning interest in infographics, there is limited experimental evidence on how different types of visualizations are processed and understood, although the effectiveness of some graphics clearly depends on the relative numeracy of an audience. Fortunately, it is increasingly easy to present data in the form of interactive visualizations and in multiple types of representation that can be adjusted to user needs and capabilities. Nonetheless, communicating deeper uncertainties resulting from incomplete or disputed knowledge--or from essential indeterminacy about the future--remains a challenge.

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“While there are many ways to represent uncertainty and risk (e.g., Spiegelhalter et al., 2011), determining how they are perceived is crucial.”
Background
Welcome to the era of vague news: a study of the demands of statistical and mathematical products in the COVID-19 pandemic media
Gal, I., & Geiger, V. (2022) · Educational Studies in Mathematics · doi:10.1007/s10649-022-10151-7 · Cited by 31
Visualising SARS-CoV-2 transmission routes and mitigations
Rutter, H., Parker, S. T., Stahl-Timmins, W., Noakes, C. J., Smyth, A., Macbeth, R., Fitzgerald, S., & Freeman, A. L. J. (2021) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj-2021-065312 · Cited by 25
Risk preferences and risk perception affect the acceptance of digital contact tracing
Albrecht, R., Jarecki, J. B., Meier, D. S., & Rieskamp, J. (2021) · Humanities and Social Sciences Communications · doi:10.1057/s41599-021-00856-0 · Cited by 30
“…consist in choice architectures such as nudges (which are effective for climate action, Nisa, 2019), graphical risk and uncertainty communication (Spiegelhalter et al., 2011), social comparisons, or the contextualisation of a novel risk in relation to old risks such as the data security of other…”
Background
Volcanic hazard map visualisation affects cognition and crisis decision-making
Clive, M. A. T., Lindsay, J. M., Leonard, G. S., Lutteroth, C., Bostrom, A., & Corballis, P. M. (2021) · International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction · doi:10.1016/j.ijdrr.2021.102102 · Cited by 31
Information, incentives, and goals in election forecasts
Gelman, A., Hullman, J. R., Wlezien, C. B., & Morris, G. E. (2020) · Judgment and Decision Making · doi:10.1017/s1930297500007981 · Cited by 30
The perception gap: how the benefits and harms of cervical cancer screening are understood in information material focusing on informed choice
Petersen, G. B., Damhus, C. S., Jønsson, A. B. R., & Brodersen, J. (2020) · Health Risk & Society · doi:10.1080/13698575.2020.1778645 · Cited by 31
“In any case, the visual displays should be supported by multiple formats of the same information and pilot-tested for understanding (Mason et al., 2014; Spiegelhalter et al., 2011).”
Background
The Neural Basis of Risky Choice with Affective Outcomes
Suter, R. S., Pachur, T., Hertwig, R., Endestad, T., & Biele, G. (2015) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0122475 · Cited by 39
“For instance, professionals who communicate risks, such as doctors or policy makers, may need to pay special attention to refocusing people’s attention on the probabilities of (health) risks by illustrating those risks visually [62, 63].”
Background
When Does Uncertainty Matter?: Understanding the Impact of Predictive Uncertainty in ML Assisted Decision Making
McGrath, S., Mehta, P., Zytek, A., Lage, I., & Lakkaraju, H. (2020) · Trans. Mach. Learn. Res. · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2011.06167 · Cited by 30
“We also consider expert decision makers–unlike most of these works–who may be able to work with more complex information about the probability distribution [17].”
Background
Communicative aspects of decision aids for localized prostate cancer treatment – A systematic review
Vromans, R., van Eenbergen, M. C. H. J., Pauws, S. C., Geleijnse, G., van der Poel, H. G., van de Poll-Franse, L. V., & Krahmer, E. (2019) · Urologic Oncology Seminars and Original Investigations · doi:10.1016/j.urolonc.2019.04.005 · Cited by 30
“However, given that this kind of information is often difficult to process and understand for many patients [18], various guidelines and best practices have been developed over the years how to communicate this through multiple channels [47,48].”
Background
Communicating the uncertainty in estimated greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture
Milne, A., Glendining, M., Lark, R., Perryman, S., Gordon, T., & Whitmore, A. (2015) · Journal of Environmental Management · doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2015.05.034 · Cited by 30
Waiting or acting now? The effect on willingness-to-pay of delivering inherent uncertainty information in choice experiments
Figuerola, C. M. T., Faccioli, M., & Font, A. R. (2016) · Ecological Economics · doi:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2016.09.001 · Cited by 26
Pharmaceutical Benefit–Risk Communication Tools: A Review of the Literature
Balog‐Way, D. H. P., Blazsin, H., Löfstedt, R. E., & Bouder, F. E. (2016) · Drug Safety · doi:10.1007/s40264-016-0466-1 · Cited by 30
Biasing and debiasing health decisions with bar graphs: Costs and benefits of graph literacy
Okan, Y., García‐Retamero, R., Cokely, E. T., & Maldonado, A. (2018) · Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology · doi:10.1177/1747021817744546 · Cited by 36
Does Introducing Imprecision around Probabilities for Benefit and Harm Influence the Way People Value Treatments?
Bansback, N. J., Harrison, M. J., & Marra, C. A. (2015) · Medical Decision Making · doi:10.1177/0272989x15600708 · Cited by 27
“0) Female, n (%) 1502 (56) 451 (59) 51 (51) 347 (57) 159 (54) Education, n (%) Up to high school level 1173 (44) 338 (44) 42 (42) 281 (46) 136 (46) Some postsecondary school 1002 (38) 282 (37) 38 (38) 231 (38) 107 (36) Undergraduate/postgraduate level 488 (18) 143 (19) 21 (21) 101 (16) 51 (17) Income, n (%) \$15,000 1…”
Graphs in the COVID-19 news: a mathematics audit of newspapers in Korea
Kwon, O., Han, C., Lee, C.-G., Lee, K., Kim, K., Jo, G., & Yoon, G. (2021) · Educational Studies in Mathematics · doi:10.1007/s10649-021-10029-0 · Cited by 27
The moderating role of childhood socioeconomic status on the impact of nudging on the perceived threat of coronavirus and stockpiling intention
Kim, J., Giroux, M., Kim, J.-E., Choi, Y. K., González‐Jiménez, H., Lee, J. C., Park, J., Jang, S., & Kim, S. (2020) · Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services · doi:10.1016/j.jretconser.2020.102362 · Cited by 31
“concept for understanding and influencing individuals’ behavioral responses to disruptive events (Spiegelhalter et al., 2011; Thaler and Sunstein, 2008).”
Public awareness and perception of environmental, health and safety risks to electricity generation: an explorative interview study in Switzerland
Volken, S. P., Wong‐Parodi, G., & Trutnevyte, E. (2017) · Journal of Risk Research · doi:10.1080/13669877.2017.1391320 · Cited by 30
“…most effectively, in terms of relevant content, appropriate wording, or ways to report probabilities (Bruine de Bruin, Mayer, and Morgan 2015; Fischhoff, Brewer, and Downs 2011, Fischhoff and Davis 2014) and visualize uncertainties (McInerny et al. 2014; Spiegelhalter, Pearson, and Short 2011).”
Background
Development of a novel, multilayered presentation format for clinical practice guidelines.
Kristiansen, A., Brandt, L., Alonso-Coello, P., Agoritsas, T., Akl, E., Conboy, T., Elbarbary, M., Ferwana, M., Medani, W., Murad, M., et al. (2015) · Chest · doi:10.1378/chest.14-1366 · Cited by 27
Why Combining Text and Visualization Could Improve Bayesian Reasoning: A Cognitive Load Perspective
Bancilhon, M., Wright, A. J., Ha, S., Crouser, R. J., & Ottley, A. (2023) · CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · doi:10.1145/3544548.3581218 · Cited by 28
“, [20, 21, 41, 42, 69]), with the most prevalent designs being Euler diagrams [11, 39, 41, 49] and frequency grids or icon arrays [8, 30, 39, 41, 49, 55, 68, 71].”
Background
Tversky and Kahneman’s Cognitive Illusions: Who Can Solve Them, and Why?
Bruckmaier, G., Krauß, S., Binder, K., Hilbert, S., & Brunner, M. (2021) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.584689 · Cited by 34
Achieving SDG 6: water resources sustainability in Caribbean Small Island Developing States through improved water governance
Mycoo, M. (2018) · doi:10.1111/1477-8947.12141 · Cited by 26
More Than Meets the Eye: Volcanic Hazard Map Design and Visual Communication
Thompson, M., Lindsay, J., & Leonard, G. (2017) · Advances in volcanology · doi:10.1007/11157_2016_47 · Cited by 26
“Visualising and communicating uncertainty in geospatial data also remains an ongoing challenge across many different fields (Aerts et al. 2003; Spiegelhalter et al. 2011; Kinkeldey et al. 2014).”
Background
Data journalism’s many futures: Diagrammatic displays and prospective probabilities in data-driven news predictions
Pentzold, C., & Fechner, D. (2020) · Convergence. The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies · doi:10.1177/1354856519880790 · Cited by 25
A New Visualization for Probabilistic Situations Containing Two Binary Events: The Frequency Net
Binder, K., Krauß, S., & Wiesner, P. (2020) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00750 · Cited by 35
Different Visualizations Cause Different Strategies When Dealing With Bayesian Situations
Eichler, A., Böcherer-Linder, K., & Vogel, M. (2020) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01897 · Cited by 24
“There is a broad consensus that visualization facilitates Bayesian reasoning (e.g., Brase, 2009; Spiegelhalter et al., 2011; Khan et al., 2015; McDowell and Jacobs, 2017).”
Background
Does Interaction Improve Bayesian Reasoning with Visualization?
Mosca, A., Ottley, A., & Chang, R. (2021) · CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · doi:10.1145/3411764.3445176 · Cited by 20
“Diferent techniques tested include Euler diagrams [4, 22, 23, 29], frequency grids or icon arrays [2, 16, 22, 23, 29, 31, 36, 41], decision trees [2, 15, 23, 36, 38], “beam cut" diagrams [17], probability curves [7], contingency tables [7, 8], double trees [2, 23, 24], fow charts [23], pipe diagrams [23], Sankey diagr…”
Method
Climate impact assessment and “islandness”: Challenges and opportunities of knowledge production and decision-making for Small Island Developing States
Foley, A. (2017) · International Journal of Climate Change Strategies and Management · doi:10.1108/ijccsm-06-2017-0142 · Cited by 24
“Communication of climate data relies heavily on visualisation; yet, there has been limited research into the effectiveness of different approaches, particularly in the context of understanding deep uncertainty (Spiegelhalter et al., 2011).”
Background
A new graphical format to communicate treatment effects to patients—A web‐based randomized controlled trial
Kasper, J., van de Roemer, A., Pöttgen, J., Rahn, A. C., Backhus, I., Bay, Y., Köpke, S., & Heesen, C. (2016) · Health Expectations · doi:10.1111/hex.12522 · Cited by 26
“Previous studies have shown that different graphical formats visualizing probabilistic information using bar graphs, survival curves and pie charts 4,6 improve patients’ understanding 7 and even the quality of physician patient communication 8,9 when compared to text-only risk information.”
Background
The socio-environmental data explorer (SEDE): a social media–enhanced decision support system to explore risk perception to hazard events
Shook, E., & Turner, V. K. (2016) · Cartography and Geographic Information Science · doi:10.1080/15230406.2015.1131627 · Cited by 24
“It is therefore important to expose these spatial information and associated metadata in a way so that end-users appreciate the potential differences and uncertainties when integrating these data (MacEachren et al. 2005; White et al. 2010; Spiegelhalter, Pearson, and Short 2011; White et al. 2015).”
Background
Less is less: a systematic review of graph use in meta‐analyses
Schild, A. H. E., & Voracek, M. (2013) · Research Synthesis Methods · doi:10.1002/jrsm.1076 · Cited by 24
“What is more, graphics can be tailored specifically to different audiences and their respective needs (Spiegelhalter et al., 2011).”
Background
The effects of communicating uncertainty around statistics, on public trust
Kerr, J. R., van der Bles, A. M., Dryhurst, S., Schneider, C., Chopurian, V., Freeman, A., & van der Linden, S. (2023) · Royal Society Open Science · doi:10.1098/rsos.230604 · Cited by 23
A Mobile App for Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: Development and Usability Study
Buss, V. H., Varnfield, M., Harris, M., & Barr, M. L. (2022) · JMIR Human Factors · doi:10.2196/35065 · Cited by 24
Social weather: A review of crowdsourcing‐assisted meteorological knowledge services through social cyberspace
Zhu, Y., Zhang, S., Li, Y., Lü, H., Shi, K., & Niu, Z. (2019) · Geoscience Data Journal · doi:10.1002/gdj3.85 · Cited by 30
“Powerful computational resources, such as high-performance supercomputers, are utilized to calculate sophisticated meteorological models (Spiegelhalter et al. , 2011).”
Method
What CPI = 0.85 Really Means: A Probabilistic Extension of the Estimate at Completion
Kim, B.-C., & Pinto, J. (2019) · Journal of Management in Engineering · doi:10.1061/(asce)me.1943-5479.0000671 · Cited by 23
Winners and losers: communicating the potential impacts of policies
Brick, C., Freeman, A. L. J., Wooding, S., Skylark, W. J., Marteau, T. M., & Spiegelhalter, D. J. (2018) · Humanities and Social Sciences Communications · doi:10.1057/s41599-018-0121-9 · Cited by 30
Self-citation
Overconfidence in Projecting Uncertain Spatial Trajectories
Herdener, N., Wickens, C., Clegg, B. A., & Smith, C. A. P. (2016) · Hum. Factors · doi:10.1177/0018720816645259 · Cited by 23
MapWatch: Detecting and Monitoring International Border Personalization on Online Maps
Soeller, G., Karahalios, K., Sandvig, C., & Wilson, C. (2016) · The Web Conference · doi:10.1145/2872427.2883016 · Cited by 23
“Beyond the archival components of this work, this data set is ripe for exploring visualization challenges such as the visualization of uncertainty — an unsolved problem in this domain [2, 14, 52], the historical representation of temporal data [56], and the dynamic visualization of invisible traces that exist in every…”
Background
The pros and cons of funnel plots as an aid to risk communication and patient decision making
Rakow, T., Wright, R. J., Spiegelhalter, D. J., & Bull, C. (2014) · British Journal of Psychology · doi:10.1111/bjop.12081 · Cited by 28
Self-citation
Patients' & Healthcare Professionals' Values Regarding True- & False-Positive Diagnosis when Colorectal Cancer Screening by CT Colonography: Discrete Choice Experiment
Boone, D., Mallett, S., Zhu, S.-H., Yao, G., Bell, N., Ghanouni, A., von Wagner, C., Taylor, S., Altman, D., Lilford, R., et al. (2013) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0080767 · Cited by 23
“Because inconsistent framing may introduce bias [27], both absolute and relative risks were displayed textually and graphically.”
Background

Authors: Spiegelhalter, D., Pearson, M., & Short, I.
Affiliations: University of Cambridge (GB)
The Open University (GB)
Corresponding author: Spiegelhalter, David
ORCID: Spiegelhalter, David
Pearson, Mike
Short, Ian
Venue: Science
Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
Published: 2011-09-09
Volume: 333
Issue: 6048
Pages: 1393-1400
ISSN: 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
1095-9203
DOI: 10.1126/science.1191181
OpenAlex: W2015011409
Cited by: 682
References: 0
Citations by year: 2026: 21 · 2025: 21 · 2024: 54 · 2023: 39 · 2022: 64 · 2021: 67 · 2020: 52 · 2019: 52 · 2018: 47 · 2017: 40 · 2016: 43 · 2015: 62 · 2014: 36 · 2013: 38 · 2012: 42
FWCI: 8.08
Type: journal article
Language: en
Open access: closed
Locations: Science (publishedVersion)
PubMed (publishedVersion)
Open Research Online (The Open University) (submittedVersion)
Topics: Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Graphics and Computer-Aided Design › Data Visualization and Analytics
Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Risk Perception and Management
Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Climate Change Communication and Perception
Keywords: uncertainty communication, probability communication, infographics, interactive visualization, numeracy, lay audiences, future uncertainty, climate uncertainty, weather forecasting, health communication, economics communication, sport
MeSH terms: Computer Graphics, Data Display, Forecasting, Humans, Probability, Risk, Information Dissemination, Uncertainty

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Visualizing Uncertainty About the Future

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