Nordpil

Survey results - using graphics to communicate environmental information

Survey results

As part of the process of developing workshops to improve the visual communication skills of environmental and sustainable development professionals, we felt it would be useful to gain an overview of their current usage of graphics and illustrations, and their related capacity-development needs.

In the spring of 2010, we posted a short survey on the Internet to assess the way that environmental and sustainable development professionals use graphics for the visual communication of information related to their work. We received 357 responses from a wide range of professionals, students and communicators from all over the world.

An analysis of the responses reveals:

  • Most respondents use graphics for communication (91%).
  • Most participants prepare the graphics themselves (82%), but a quarter have staff to assist them in this task.
  • When assessing their own abilities, half of the respondents indicated that their skills were sufficient and half indicated that they were insufficient.
  • Many areas were mentioned when participants noted the areas in which they wanted to build capacity: analysis and data management, software tools, and design principles.


For download and viewing of the full report, see the bar to the right.



We, the authors, would like to extend our thanks to the following networks, which published the call for survey participation: