A little about me..
2nd year. Majoring in English Language & Linguistics.
I find solace in long periods of
Hence, "snorlax".
(Note: That's a pokemon.)
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Generate an information graphic that explains the relationship among gross revenue, gross expenses, cost of fuel and cost of fuel as a percentage of expenses from the year 2000 to 2009.
First and foremost, information graphics, according to Lester (2006), is a “visual display” that comprises of data which is either tabulated or structured into diagrams aided by a text in order to tell a story to its audience (p. 176). Thus, according to this definition, an information graph has a narrative. Examples of information are line graphs, bar graphs, pie charts, etc.
The information graphic I have created for the purpose of this task is as follows:
For a clearer version, download here.In the formation of my information graph, I chose to represent the gross revenue and the gross expenses in the form of a bar graph. I purposely chose a bar graph because comparisons are easier to interpret when data is formulated side by side. Toor (1996) claims that bar graphs is the ideal information graph when showing comparison that can be easily understood.
However, when compared to the graph provided by Dr Chris Woo, I realized there was something I did not take into account. As the graph is supposed to represent four sets of variables, bar graphs would make the graph look too messy. The preferable type of graph would be a line chart in this case. Despite Toor's (1996) claim that the purpose of a line graph is similar to a bar graph – to present information and comparison, Achelis (2001) had identified the advantage of a line chart, that is, although it is simple, it is the easiest to understand as data is not crammed together. Therefore, as there is supposed to be three variables pertaining to cost in this graph, a line chart would be the preferred type of information graphic. However, if all the sets of data pertaining to cost were similar in value, the line graph might end up returning unfavourable results, like this:
from google images
The lines keep overlapping one another and when a lot of variables are included in a single line graph, it can end up looking too cluttered, thus this defeats the purpose of info graphics as a way to make interpreting data much easier.
When constructing my graph, I misunderstood cost of fuel and cost of fuel of as percentage of expenses to be the same. The cost of fuel is not represented in my graph, while the cost of fuel as percentage of expenses is represented with a line graph. I chose the line graph as it contrasts from the bar graph which I used to represent gross revenue and gross expenses. The main purpose of the graph is to show trend and comparison, therefore I used both the bar graph and line graph simultaneously in order to show the differences. In relation to the answer provided by Dr Chris Woo, a pictograph would have been the ideal choice as pictographs can be used to provide extra data on a line or a bar chart.
