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Graphical Communication of Uncertain Quantities to Nontechnical People
Author(s) -
Ibrekk Harald,
Morgan M. Granger
Publication year - 1987
Publication title -
risk analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.972
H-Index - 130
eISSN - 1539-6924
pISSN - 0272-4332
DOI - 10.1111/j.1539-6924.1987.tb00488.x
Subject(s) - cumulative distribution function , statistics , function (biology) , probability density function , scale (ratio) , mathematics , probability distribution , computer science , psychology , geography , cartography , evolutionary biology , biology
Nine pictorial displays for communicating quantitative information about the value of an uncertain quantity, x , were evaluated for their ability to communicate x̄ , p ( x > a ) and p ( b > x > a ) to well‐educated semi‐and nontechnical subjects. Different displays performed best in different applications. Cumulative distribution functions alone can severely mislead some subjects in estimating the mean. A “rusty” knowledge of statistics did not improve performance, and even people with a good basic knowledge of statistics did not perform as well as one would like. Until further experiments are performed, the authors recommend the use of a cumulative distribution function plotted directly above a probability density function with the same horizontal scale, and with the location of the mean clearly marked on both curves.