What is it about?

Creating data visualizations requires a series of decisions, ranging from type of data and communicated message, to how the message is represented, and finally the technology used to visualize the message. When it involves many layers of information, the visualization becomes complex, thus involving many decisions. This report explains the decision-making process of a complex data visualization showing relationships between COVID-19 pandemic and different environmental factors affecting it.

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Why is it important?

Sharing this experience report on the creation of complex data visualization helps other visualization creators learn from the decision-making process involved in the project. Navigating obstacles at various stages while linking practice to theory benefits professionals, researchers, and communicators aiming at similar endeavors.

Perspectives

This project took different forms at different stages. I started it as a poster at the Oxford Global Health and Bioethics conference, then as a presentation at SIGDOC Orlando 2023, and finally as an experience report at CDQ 2025. At every stage, I saw the project from a different angle, and gained tremendous experience from my work on each stage. What stayed with me in the end is that hardworking and patience are always rewarding, so I should never shy away from difficult undertakings.

Nada Dimashkieh Chehab
University of Central Florida

Read the Original

This page is a summary of: Complex Data Visualization Decision-Making: The Case of a Circular Dendrogram on Health-Related Data, Communication Design Quarterly, December 2025, ACM (Association for Computing Machinery),
DOI: 10.1145/3787586.3787588.
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