1981

Expected

Observed - Expected

Belief Over Time

Uniform
All states have the same rate.

Boom
All states have the rate they had in 1998.

Bust
All states have the rate they had in 1981.

A sample Surprise Map of U.S. average unemployment from 1981-1998. This page is a demo for our paper at VIS 2016. For an explanation of what makes surprise maps tick, check out our Medium post. For code, or to offer suggestions, go to our github repo.

The large map on the left shows the data - the unemployment rate per state. The large map on the right shows the surprise: what states have the most unexpected unemployment rates? Red are surprisingly high values, blue are surprising low. Driving the surprise are three models of expectation:

We show the expected values predicted by each model, as well as the difference between the observed and expected values. After each year, we use this difference to update our beliefs about the models. Small differences mean good evidence, large differences are good counter-evidence. Large shifts in belief cause surprise. Use the slider to navigate between years, and see how the surprise map changes over time.