How Charts Lie: Getting Smarter about Visual Information

A leading data visualization expert explores the negative-and positive-influences that charts have on our perception of truth.

We've all heard that a picture is worth a thousand words, but what if we don't understand what we're looking at? Social media has made charts, infographics, and diagrams ubiquitous-and easier to share than ever. We associate charts with science and reason; the flashy visuals are both appealing and persuasive. Pie charts, maps, bar and line graphs, and scatter plots (...