(67) Visualizing very small risks
Related Images
About the task
Some risk communication situations require helping people to visualize just how rare very rare events are. A common example occurs in prenatal genetic testing. If a couple has no other risk factors, the baseline risk of genetic diseases such as Down Syndrome is often much smaller than even 1 in 1000 (0.1%). Visually showing this ratio is challenging.
What’s special about this image?
This simple graphic reinforces the smallness of the risk by comparing the dot and the much larger circle. The design emphasizes gist-level emotional reaction more than thinking and cognition.
How did it do?
With this graphic, people's gist accuracy was significantly higher and their risk perceptions were lower than with other images. We recommend this graphic.