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Knowledge Mushohwe Correspondent
IN recent times, information graphics, or infographics have become an accepted and relevant form of newspaper art. In the wider context, an infographic is a visual medium used by scientists, technicians, teachers and journalists for explaining news as well as inventions, theories, games, accidents or structures of buildings, machines and living beings. They are used to illustrate and clarify difficult issues so that the readers can more easily conceptualise and understand complex structural aspects, stages of a process, as well as effects and causes of an action.

Information graphics are often used to explain in technical contexts, particularly in the natural sciences and in the domain of medicine.
Infographics are effective because of their visual element.

Humans receive input from all five of their senses (sight, touch, hearing, smell, taste), but they receive significantly more information from vision than any of the other four.
In medical contexts, for example, information graphics often illustrate location and function of inner organs, causes and effects of injuries, medical treatment etc.

In newspapers, an information graphic is formed as a unit, consisting of textual and pictorial components that are attached to or embedded in a text article with the same or related contents.

An information graphic usually consists of three components; text of various complexity, including key words, phrases, sentences, text, paragraphs, pictures on various levels of detail (abstract or naturalistic), and graphical means such as arrows, movement lines, zoom boxes, highlighting devices.

An information graphic fulfils several functions that, for example, photos cannot accomplish.
In science, for example, it shows things under the surface.
Skin profiles, body organs and skeletal tissues may be presented simultaneously in an infographic.

It also helps the reader to conceptualise how something is constructed or how something functions, such as graphic instructions found on the back end of product packages..
An infographic may also explain dynamic processes step by step, and in some instances creates a coupling between parts of the whole while depicting several perspectives at once.
Nigel Holmes – one of the world’s leading infographic experts and manager of Time Magazine – says information graphics “makes numbers, processes and facts understandable”.

Research in the United States of America shows when graphic design really took off during the 1980s newspaper graphics were seen to be “single-dimensioned” work.
Much like news reporting, information graphics presented data in objective fashion.

The research defined graphics as “map reality for readers”, an ability to present an authoritative map of the day’s events.
A 1984 study in America examined front pages of newspaper across the continent and found that they were more graphically pleasing than ever before.
America is big, so is the newspaper industry. Competition is fierce.

Editors’ concerns about competitive appearance of their papers resulted in a good looking front page, with readers attending more to photos than stories and higher readership for stories accompanied by a photograph.

What meaning or understanding does the reader gain from information graphics?
“Chartoons”, the combination of graph and cartoon elements pioneered by USA Today, are used to display quantitative information.
Chartoons are found to be effective in attracting reader attention and making quantitative information easier to understand than plain graphs.

Researchers in America reported that reader retention of information improves when statistical data is displayed in a table or graph.
Readers’ recall of news facts can be improved by providing specific information in a “HOW” graphic instead of through story text alone.
“HOW” graphics also make a newspaper more attractive and give relevance to the growing importance of visual presentation of news.

A 1990 experiment concluded that most readers viewed a large graphic before reading the story but read the story first if the graphic was small.
This finding suggests that readers expect charts, photographs and other visual communication tools to fulfil informational needs.

In all, information graphics may be used to attract attention, help pull a reader into a story, provide emotional content and/or contextualise meaning
There are, however, some limitations to information graphics.
Distorted graphics may mislead readers. Editors need to be certain a design helps readers interpret the information presented.

Infographics cannot afford to be either subjective or ambiguous.
Because they are read in the same breath as news stories, they are bound by the same rules and regulations that regulate mainstream journalism.
The information they carry cannot be divorced from that in the original news story – they are useless unless they complement or augment what the text says.
Infographics have to add value to the newspapers, and if done badly or hurriedly they may turn to be an eyesore for the general reader.
Not every news story requires an infographic because crystallising a part of a story should be so that the reader benefits.

Value addition and data enhancement, rather than page aesthetics, should be the two main reasons why newspapers choose to use infographics.