Visual Revelations: Graphical Tales of Fate and Deception From Napoleon Bonaparte To Ross Perot [Hardcover]

Howard Wainer (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0805838783 | ISBN-13: 978-0805838787 | Publication Date: July 1, 2000

To function in modern society complex data must be absorbed and understood at a breakneck pace. The most efficient way to do this is through data-based graphics. This book is an exploration and celebration of graphical methods of data presentation.

Visual Revelations' principal purpose is to enlighten, inform, and amuse the reader regarding the shortcomings of common graphical practices; particularly how they can misinform while simultaneously providing models of wonderful graphics. There are many examples of the best graphic practice, graphs that go beyond conveying, facts, and structure to be able to carry emotion as well.

Aimed at an educated, lay audience, this volume benefits anyone who must either convey or receive quantitative information, including designers, statisticians, and people in the media.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Howard Wainer's splendid How to Display Data Badly [Chapter 1] covers standard practice among advertisers, economists, and apologists, and should be distributed to every household in the country along with the next batch of Charters.
—London Times Literary Supplement

...Visual Revelations is the kind of book to read for fun and to discover later that you learned something....
—Psychometrika

Wainer's books are simply the most entertaining, engaging, and thought-provoking books in the area.
—Sr. VP of SPSS
Leland Wilkinson

Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Psychology Press (July 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805838783
• ISBN-13: 978-0805838787
• Product Dimensions: 11.3 x 8.7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #985,842 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dr. Wainer received his Ph. D. from Princeton University in 1968. After serving on the faculty of the University of Chicago, a period at the Bureau of Social Science Research during the Carter Administration, and 21 years as Principal Research Scientist in the Research Statistics Group at Educational Testing Service, he is now Distinguished Research Scientist at the National Board of Medical Examiners and Professor (adjunct) of Statistics at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Wainer has a long-standing interest in the use of graphical methods for data analysis and communication, robust statistical methodology, and the development and application of generalizations of item response theory. His work on testlet response theory has combined all three. His latest book , Picturing the uncertain world. (Princeton University Press) was published in April of 2009. His next book, Uneducated Guesses, will be appearing in mid-2011.

Dr. Wainer was elected a Fellow in the American Statistical Association in 1985 and a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association in 2009. He was awarded the Educational Testing Service's Senior Scientist Award in 1990 and selected for the Lady Davis Prize and was named the Schonbrun Visiting Professor at the Hebrew University in 1992. He received the 2006 National Council on Measurement in Education Award for Scientific Contribution to a Field of Educational Measurement for his development of Testlet Response Theory and given NCME's career achievement award in 2007, and he received the Samuel J. Messick Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award from Division 5 of the American Psychological Association in 2009 and was included in Who's Who in America, 2009 and 2010.

He was on the editorial board of Psychological Methods and the editor of the Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics from 2002 until 2004 and is a former Associate Editor of the Journal of the American Statistical Association, and Applied Psychological Measurement as well as a former Treasurer of the Psychometric Society. Since 1990 he has written a popular column on data visualization in the statistics magazine Chance;

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Stick with Tufte, September 21, 2003

By 

Liam Friedland "liamf" (Redwood City, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Visual Revelations: Graphical Tales of Fate and Deception From Napoleon Bonaparte To Ross Perot (Hardcover)

Don't waste your time on this one. Get Ed Tufte's first two books. Wainer spends many pages regurgitating and adulating Tufte's previously published work--unfortunately with less clarity.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good, but not in the class of Tufte, September 25, 2008

By 

Mr. A. Wentzel "Arnold Wentzel" (Cresta, South Africa) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Visual Revelations: Graphical Tales of Fate and Deception From Napoleon Bonaparte To Ross Perot (Hardcover)

Having read Tufte's "The visual display of Quantitative Information" and this book of Howard Wainer, I think Tufte's book is better. If Tufte's book is five or four stars, this one would be one star less.

It seems as though Tufte's books set the standard, and Wainer acknowledges this. Many of his examples are similar to that in Tufte's book, and he covers much of the same material. There are overlaps (and when there are, Tufte's book is usually more comprehensive). But Wainer's book also covers material that Tufte does not cover well or at all.

Wainer's approach is also different. His first two long chapters are about "graphical failures" and rules for how to display data badly. These failures are very instructive and draws the reader in to try and create improvement. His next five chapters are about graphical triumphs, not as useful as the first two chapters, but still enjoyable. His chapters here are short, too short in fact, and sometimes too dense. Here I liked his discussion of Feynman diagrams as a case in how diagrams can open up understanding of complex ideas. Chapters 8-13 are probably where there is the least overlap with Tufte (such as the discussions of trilinear plots, Nigthingale rose, double Y-axis graphs, a good discussion of pie charts, and implicit graphs.) At this point, one could stop reading as the last 30 pages or so are better covered in Tufte's book.

Overall, this is a useful book, with some insights not found in Tufte. The book is easy to read and very instructive. But if you had a limited budget, I would buy Tufte's book.

3.0 out of 5 stars Not Great, September 10, 2008

By 

D. R. Pitts "daverpitts" (Issaquah, WA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Visual Revelations: Graphical Tales of Fate and Deception From Napoleon Bonaparte To Ross Perot (Hardcover)

This work has been covered by Tufte Generally better, and Tuftes books are cheaper. The material is sound but the print quality in this book is not as good as Tuftes Graphic Press, The majority of the charts are reproduced in the text in black and white, while some are duplicated in color plates (many look like Photographs) the quality is very Variable. However the Subject is worth while and demands wider coverage, especially given the strange directions Tufte has taken in his 4th book , lets hope the Author will be encouraged to "try" again.