Finally, a crucial component to a strong visual argument is to help the audience understand why the visualization matters. Why is the takeaway from the graph relevant, interesting, or noteworthy? Often, even a single sentence of context can make a world of difference to the strength of the argument.

While this is a critical skill for presenting data visualizations, it generally requires no coding. Instead, we’ll use our skills of analysis and communication to explain – simply and clearly – what the visualization means.

As a reminder, here’s the context for our graph:

• Primary forests are forests that have had no human intervention.
• Secondary forests are regrowth forests that have been previously clear-cut or otherwise majorly disrupted by human activity such as logging.
• Selectively Logged Forests are forests that are managed with limited extraction.

The crucial takeaway for this graph: How do different human interventions, or no human interventions, impact the number and diversity of tree species in different types of Tapajos Forests?

We don’t have to answer all parts of this large and complex question, but providing a starting place for the viewer to start drawing their own conclusions from the graph is super helpful.