Graphical Communication of Uncertain Quantities to Nontechnical People

Harald Ibrekk and M. Granger Morgan

Risk Analysis, 1987, vol. 7, issue 4, 519-529

Abstract: 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.

Date: 1987
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.1987.tb00488.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:riskan:v:7:y:1987:i:4:p:519-529

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Risk Analysis from John Wiley & Sons
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().