Amer, T. S. (2008) The effect of visual illusions on the graphical display of information: Evidence of bias and mitigation: Working paper series--08-05. Working Paper. NAU W.A. Franke College of Business.
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Abstract
Graphical displays of business and accounting information are widely used as decision aids. Those who use Excel and other programs with graphics generation capabilities are faced with many options for organizing and displaying information in graphs in a manner that does not result in biased decision making or information extraction. This paper describes four graphs each of which exhibits characteristics associated with a certain known visual illusion. A controlled experiment was carried out to demonstrate the visual illusions resulted in systematically biased decision making. It is also proposed and validated that the bias can be mitigated by including properly formatted gridlines when preparing the graphs. The implication of this research is that that an important addition to the set of generally accepted graph preparation guidelines is to include properly formatted gridlines in graphs. Data Availability: Data are available from the author; however, request for data should specify the intended use.
| Item Type: | Monograph (Working Paper) |
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| Publisher’s Statement: | Copyright, where appropriate, is held by the author. |
| ID number or DOI: | 08-05 |
| Keywords: | Working paper, visual illusions, bias in decision making, gridlines |
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD28 Management. Industrial Management |
| NAU Depositing Author Academic Status: | Faculty/Staff |
| Department/Unit: | The W.A. Franke College of Business |
| Date Deposited: | 18 Oct 2015 00:43 |
| URI: | http://openknowledge.nau.edu/id/eprint/1530 |
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