Infograpihcs
🎯 In this topic you will
- Draw and interpret infographics
🧠 Key Words
- infographic
Show Definitions
- infographic: A visual representation of information or data, often combining images, charts, and text to make ideas clearer.
The word infographic is short for ‘information graphic’.
An infographic is a visual representation of information or data. An infographic shows information quickly and clearly.
For example, this infographic clearly shows that over a half (50%) of women go for a walk every day, whereas less than a half of men go for a walk every day.
54% of women
45% of men
Percentage of adults that go for a walk every day
❓ EXERCISES
1. This infographic shows the mass of bananas produced by different countries.
a. Which country produces the most bananas?
b. What mass of bananas does China produce?
c. Copy and complete this sentence: India produces ___ million tonnes more bananas than Brazil.
👀 Show answer
1a. India produces the most bananas (11 million tonnes).
1b. China produces 4.8 million tonnes.
1c. India produces $11 - 6.3 = 4.7$ million tonnes more than Brazil.
2. Viktor sees this infographic at a train station. It shows the percentage of trains that arrive early, on time, late or are cancelled.
a. What percentage of trains arrive early?
b. What percentage of trains are cancelled?
c. The train station manager says: “Over half of our trains arrive on time.” Is the manager correct? Explain your answer.
👀 Show answer
2a. 15% arrive early.
2b. 5% are cancelled.
2c. On time = 45%. This is not more than half, so the manager is incorrect.
3. This infographic shows the number of people killed by animals in one year.
a. How many people were killed by a lion?
b. How many more people were killed by an elephant than by a wolf?
c. Which animal killed the most number of people?
👀 Show answer
3a. 120 people were killed by a lion.
3b. Elephant 150 − Wolf 10 = 140 more people.
3c. The crocodile killed the most (950 people).
4. This infographic shows information about cars.
a. What percentage of people: i) always wear their seat belt? ii) do not always wear their seat belt? iii) got their first car when they were 18 years old? iv) have never owned a car?
b. At what age is it most popular for people to get their first car?
c. Which country has 259 cars per 1000 people?
d. Which country listed on the chart has the least number of cars per 1000 people?
e. Copy and complete this sentence: ___ has six times as many cars per 1000 people as ___.
👀 Show answer
4a.
- i) 84%
- ii) 16%
- iii) 22%
- iv) 9%
4b. At 22 years old (most popular age).
4c. Russia has 259 cars per 1000 people.
4d. India has the least (13 per 1000).
4e. USA (404 per 1000) has six times as many cars as Brazil (50 per 1000).
5. This infographic shows the results of a survey. The speech bubbles show the topics that people ask about online. They also show the percentage of people that ask about each topic.
a. What percentage of people ask about health?
b. Which topic is asked about the most?
c. i) What do you notice about the size of the speech bubbles and the percentages? ii) Do you think it is a good idea to have speech bubbles of different sizes? Explain why.
👀 Show answer
5a. 29% of people ask about health.
5b. Relationships are asked about the most (33%).
5c(i). The bigger the percentage, the bigger the speech bubble. The sizes match the data visually.
5c(ii). Yes, it is a good idea, because it makes it easier to compare topics at a glance. The viewer can immediately see which topics are more common. However, exact percentages are still needed for accuracy.
🧠 Think like a Mathematician
Task: Analyse the infographic showing how often people of different ages visit the dentist. Identify trends and suggest reasons for the changes.
Infographic summary:
- 21–35 years: 63% no visits, 32% 1 visit, 5% 2+ visits
- 36–50 years: 68% no visits, 25% 1 visit, 7% 2+ visits
- 51–65 years: 65% no visits, 20% 1 visit, 15% 2+ visits
- Over 65 years: 58% no visits, 14% 1 visit, 28% 2+ visits
Questions:
👀 show answer
- Trends: - The proportion of people with no visits decreases slightly with age (63% → 58%). - The proportion of people with 1 visit decreases more clearly (32% → 14%). - The proportion with 2+ visits increases significantly (5% → 28%).
- Reasons: - Younger adults may avoid or postpone dentist visits due to cost, lack of problems, or busy lifestyles. - Middle-aged and older adults may develop more dental issues, increasing the need for regular visits. - Over 65s may have more frequent check-ups due to gum disease, tooth decay, dentures, or general health monitoring.
- Conclusion: As people get older, they are less likely to have only one annual visit but more likely to need frequent dental care.
🧠 Think like a Mathematician
Task: Evaluate Adira’s infographic, compare it to the data in the table, and suggest improvements.
Table of percentages:
| Day | Doctor | Nurse |
| Monday | 10% | 20% |
| Tuesday | 6% | 12% |
| Wednesday | 4% | 10% |
| Thursday | 8% | 5% |
| Friday | 12% | 25% |
Adira’s infographic:
- Doctor’s appointments: shown with pictograms (Monday–Friday).
- Nurse’s appointments: shown with 3D bars (Monday–Friday).
Questions:
👀 show answer
- What’s good: - Both sets of data are included (doctor and nurse). - Percentages are labelled clearly.
- Problems: - Two different styles are used (pictogram for doctor, 3D bars for nurse), which makes comparison harder. - Doctor’s pictogram doesn’t scale perfectly – e.g. 6% vs 4% are hard to distinguish by icons alone. - 3D bar chart for nurses may exaggerate values visually.
- Improvements: - Use the same style (e.g. bar chart or line graph) for both doctors and nurses to make comparison clearer. - Ensure scales are consistent and proportional. - Consider a grouped bar chart: days on the x-axis, % missed on the y-axis, with two bars per day (doctor vs nurse). - Alternatively, use a double-line graph to track changes across the week.
- Conclusion: Adira’s infographic contains the right numbers but could be improved by using a consistent, accurate, and more easily comparable visual format.
⚠️ Be careful!
- Check the base total: percentages in a single infographic should sum to $100\%$; if not, find out what’s excluded.
- Length vs area vs volume: bars should encode by length; pictograms/bubbles/3D shapes scale by area/volume and can mislead.
- No 3D effects: perspective and shadows can exaggerate differences; prefer flat, 2D graphics.
- Consistent scales: axes and legends must use equal intervals; don’t compare figures drawn with different scales.
- Zero baseline: for bar charts, start at zero; truncated axes overstate small differences.
- Label clearly: every segment/bar needs a label and unit (%, people, tonnes). Include a title and source when possible.
- Beware icon counts: confirm whether a half or faded icon means half a unit or just decoration; check the key.
- Sample sizes matter: a bigger percentage in a smaller group may be fewer people than a smaller percentage in a larger group.
- Color/legend consistency: keep the same color for the same category across the whole infographic to avoid confusion.
- Avoid double encoding confusion: don’t read both length and area for the same data; use the intended encoding only.
- Round responsibly: small rounding errors can make totals ≠ 100%; note rounding or adjust the final category.
- Compare like with like: don’t mix percentages with counts without converting using the same total $T$.