Data Tables & Graphs
Good evening everyone,
We are having a little trouble with our graphs and data tables and I wanted to try and get out in front of this a little bit seeing as we are going to be working with these all semester. There's no sense in losing points on our lab reports moving forward if we can tidy these up a little. Below I have included some examples of good and bad data tables and graphs. By the way, none of these are from students in our class, I have found these online as examples for you to look over.
Bad Graph
This graph has a few issues. First of all, look at where 0 is placed on the y-axis. That shouldn't be the case. Place it at the point where the x and y axis intersect. Second, there is no title. If you were to open this lab report and quickly scan the graphs and data tables (which many scientists do when they first dive into research) you would have no idea what is being communicated here. A good, comprehensive, title is critical. Make sure it is crystal clear what your data is all about. There are also no labels for the axes. You need to have the axes labeled and there needs to be units associated. For example, just putting time on the x-axis doesn't work. Are we looking at 20 seconds, minutes, years?
Good graph
Notice all the features that we mentioned previously as being absent are present on this graph. Title, axes labeled with units, and they have included two data sets for comparison on one graph by simply using different colors. Units are properly scaled on both axes.
Bad Data Table
Similar to a bad graph, if I picked up this lab report and turned to this data table there would be very little that I could discern from this. I see voltage, angle, voltage again and some numbers on the left hand side. I have no idea what any of this represents. A good data table, just like a good graph, gives a quick comprehensible snapshot of the data from the experiment. It should take no more than 15-20 seconds for the reader to make sense of what you're trying to communicate.
Good data table
Notice how it would take you about 20 seconds or so to gather and process a lot of information about the data surrounding this experiment. You could scan these data tables and graphs for a couple of minutes, then go back and read this lab report and have a good understanding of what is being communicated.
As always, please reach out with any questions or concerns you might have.