Reducing Presentation Noise !

SF Data Mining Meetup November 2015 Hunter Whitney

Consultant, Author, and Instructor User Experience (UX) Design

Listening to Data

Noise !Irrelevant, meaningless, and can distract or mislead from the best course of action

Signals Potentially meaningful and can prompt actions that lead to good outcomes

Reducing Presentation Noise Doesn’t Begin or End with Visual Design

Data Life Cycle User Perception

• Context, Emphasis, and Design

• Perception and Distortion

•  Feedback, Tuning, Muting

• GIGO, Data Entry, and Error Handling

4 UX Design Considerations

Context, Emphasis, and Design

An Alarming Problem

Design Choices

Signal

Noise

Murmurs

8 7 6

Sensitivity, Specificity, and Severity

Crosstalk

Detector Proliferation

If it ain’t broke, don’t show it

Prioritization and Disclosure

Reactor 1 Core Temp.

Other 9 ✔

Water Level in Tank 2

Workplace Accidents

You Can’t Always Think Your Way Out

Perceptual Distortions

Cognitive Bias and Communication Distortions

The Data

The Same Data

Feedback, Tuning, Muting

Muting

GIGO, Data Entry, and Error Handling

"Organizations haven't realized until recently, the majority of their data sets have something wrong with them. Using visualization allows us to sometimes see potentially dangerous errors and omissions.”

“Data visualization is worthwhile if for the data cleaning capabilities alone."

999-Year-Old Patients

BenShneidermanHumanComputerInterac4onLaboratory,UniversityofMaryland

A Case in Point

Personal Resonance

http://www.cdc.gov/genomics/update/file/images/spotlight/2014-03_sequencing.jpg

Finding Meaningful Signals

Decision-Making

Another Example

ExpressionPlot

Thank You! Questions?

@hunterwhitney

Cell.2011Mar18;144(6):860-3.doi:10.1016/j.cell.2011.03.007.Boos4ngsignal-to-noiseincomplexbiology:priorknowledgeispower.IdekerT1,DutkowskiJ,HoodL.