Data Visualization and Communication Flashcards
7 cards from real MS-DS Master of Data science practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 7 Data Visualization and Communication flashcards as text
Which storytelling framework structures a data presentation as: situation → complication → resolution?
Answer: McKinsey SCQA (Situation-Complication-Question-Answer)
Barbara Minto's Pyramid Principle and McKinsey's SCQA both use Situation → Complication → Question → Answer to drive executive communication.
A researcher needs to display uncertainty around a regression line for a general audience. Which representation is most likely to be correctly interpreted?
Answer: Confidence interval as a shaded band
Shaded confidence bands are the most widely understood uncertainty representation for regression, directly showing where the true line likely falls.
What is the key difference between an explanatory and an exploratory visualization?
Answer: Explanatory is designed to communicate a specific finding to an audience; exploratory is for the analyst to discover patterns
Exploratory visualizations help the data scientist find insights; explanatory visualizations are polished communications designed to convey a specific message to an audience.
Which D3.js concept binds data values to DOM elements and creates, updates, or removes elements as data changes?
Answer: Data join (enter-update-exit pattern)
D3's data join pattern uses .data() to bind arrays, .enter() for new elements, .exit() for removed elements, and the update selection for existing ones.
A Sankey diagram is best suited to visualize which type of data?
Answer: Flow quantities between nodes in a network or process
Sankey diagrams encode flow magnitude as band width between source and target nodes, ideal for showing energy flows, user journeys, or budget allocations.
When presenting findings to a non-technical executive audience, which annotation strategy is most effective?
Answer: Placing descriptive callout text directly on the chart at the key insight location
Direct labeling and callout annotations eliminate the need for the viewer to cross-reference a legend and guide attention to the intended takeaway.
Which chart is most appropriate for showing how a single total value is decomposed into additive components that themselves further decompose?
Answer: Sunburst chart
A sunburst chart uses concentric rings to show hierarchical part-to-whole relationships at multiple levels, with each ring representing one level of the hierarchy.