ABSTRACT
People are so accustomed to seeing graphs on television, in publications, and on the Internet that a chapter on graphing may seem unnecessary. Graphs are easy to make with widely available software. But visual displays of data can be misleading, and the graph with the prettiest colors may not communicate the results of a study accurately and effectively. In addition, one of the most valuable aspects of graphing data is that the researcher is able to explore the data visually and achieve a greater understanding of the phenomena being studied. In this chapter, we explain the advantages and disadvantages of different kinds of graphs. We will show some bad graphs to serve as a contrast with better graphs. Making graphs is easy, but making graphs well can take careful thought and sometimes several attempts. The reasons for creating graphs include developing an understanding of research results, summarizing the data, and communicating the results quickly and accurately. These reasons may remind you of the purpose of descriptive statistics. But as you will see, graphs can reveal details about our data that are missed by descriptive statistics.
