This course helps you develop the ability to think critically about numbers, graphs, and visualizations that you encounter in news media. Data are inescapable and all kinds of folks use numbers to convince you of their ideas, but when are their arguments based on evidence and when should you doubt their claims? Through this course, you will practice unpacking numerical arguments and make your own decision about whether they are convincing and trustworthy. We’ll go through different examples and apply principles of good visualizations to assess how data are presented. This course is open to any student regardless of interest or experience, and it may even inspire you to study advanced courses about data visualization. General education credits: RSN
Learning Objectives
By the end of this course, you will be able to- identify the type of data used to make the data visualizations that frequently appear in news media.
- interpret and evaluate claims based on visualizations, analyses, sources, and arguments of numerical data.
- compare numbers and numerical arguments reported in news media compared to primary scientific sources.
- critique of a data visualization used in journalism, including recognizing its biases.
- apply a critical lens to ethical and unethical ways to persuade the public.