8 b] Explain the variants of bar chart with example.
Bar Chart
In a bar chart, the bar length encodes the value. There are two variants of bar charts: vertical bar charts and horizontal bar charts.
Use
While they are both used to compare numerical values across categories, vertical bar charts are sometimes used to show a single variable over time.
Don’ts of Bar Charts
- Don’t confuse vertical bar charts with histograms. Bar charts compare different variables or categories, while histograms show the distribution for a single variable.
- Another common mistake is to use bar charts to show central tendencies among groups or categories. Use box plots or violin plots to show statistical measures or distributions in these cases.
The following diagram compares movie ratings, giving two different scores. The Tomatometer is the percentage of approved critics who have given a positive review for the movie. The Audience Score is the percentage of users who have given a score of 3.5 or higher out of 5. As we can see, The Martian is the only movie with both a high Tomatometer and Audience Score. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey has a relatively high Audience Score compared to the Tomatometer score, which might be due to a huge fan base:
