Day 38: Hex Maps & Happiest States

Today’s Visualization

Title: Happiest States in the US

Notes: Here’s another attempt at using a hex map, this time with happiness measures by state from this WalletHub data.

Tools: Google Sheets, Tableau

Reflection

For today’s visualization, I used this dataset from WalletHub, which quantifies each US state’s happiness level based on 31 different metrics. Admittedly, I took this dataset at face value for the sake of practice, but you can read more about their data collection and calculations here.

This dataset is a good use case for a hex map because Hawaii comes in near the top of every ranking, a finding that could be overlooked if Hawaii was shown with its actual shape and separate from the rest of the map. There are some other interesting patterns in this data as well, so I hope to revisit them in the future.

I chose to use a diverging color palette (a gradient of two colors, instead of just one) because happiness rankings break down into relative “happy” and “unhappy” states. Diverging color palettes allow for more distinction between high and low values, which helps differentiate the happiest states from the least happy states. At first glance, it’s clear that the orange states differ from the blue states; one glance at the title provides the context that orange = happier and blue = less happy. Once again, I used blue and orange because it’s a colorblind-friendly palette with high contrast that helps all viewers!

Today’s Recommendation

Lost But Not Forgotten: Famous Art Heists Around the World

This breakdown of art heists around the world is fascinating! At the end, the creator dives into the theft of $500 million of art from one museum in 1990 that still hasn’t been solved–very interesting, so I’d recommend checking out the full viz here.

Until tomorrow, Paige