A User Study on Hybrid Graph Visualizations

Hybrid visualizations mix different metaphors in a single layout of a network. In particular, the popular NodeTrix model, introduced by Henry, Fekete, and McGuffin in 2007, combines node-link diagrams and matrix-based representations to support the analysis of real-world networks that are globally s...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors Di Giacomo, Emilio, Didimo, Walter, Montecchiani, Fabrizio, Tappini, Alessandra
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published 23.08.2021
Subjects
Computer Science - Human-Computer Interaction
Computer Science - Social and Information Networks
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DOI10.48550/arxiv.2108.10270

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Summary:Hybrid visualizations mix different metaphors in a single layout of a network. In particular, the popular NodeTrix model, introduced by Henry, Fekete, and McGuffin in 2007, combines node-link diagrams and matrix-based representations to support the analysis of real-world networks that are globally sparse but locally dense. That idea inspired a series of works, proposing variants or alternatives to NodeTrix. We present a user study that compares the classical node-link model and three hybrid visualization models designed to work on the same types of networks. The results of our study provide interesting indications about advantages/drawbacks of the considered models on performing classical tasks of analysis. At the same time, our experiment has some limitations and opens up to further research on the subject.
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.2108.10270