Existing visualizations about COVID19 are mostly on cases, infection rates, and impacts on the economy and climate, but almost none on the emotional impact. I want the audience to feel emotionally connected to my visualization and feel good in this pandemic world, so I did a non-conventional visualization, showing mood changes based on different demographics, and contextual variables such as physical activity, sleep, social contact, and work. There are a few studies conducted on this topic which contributed the data including demographics, weekly contextual information, and daily mood changes.

My data questions are: What are some measures the government and community can take to help the most affected demographics? What are some strategies for individuals to support their own emotional well-being?

My visualization consists of two columns. In the right column, the contextual variables can be changed at the top and are encoded with line, area, shape, orientation, and motion to animate the stick figure shown in the middle screen. The demographic groups can be changed at the bottom and are encoded with area, shape, and colour hue. There is also a correlated mode to connect different variables together to showcase their impact. On the left, the mood indicator shows valence which measures the positivity of mood and is encoded with horizontal positions; and arousal which measures the activation of mood and is encoded with vertical positions. The combination of valence and arousal indicates different emotions influenced by the changes in the context and demographics.

It is observed that generally, mood gets more positive with increasing age, income, living space, and family number in household. This suggests that more emotional support should be given to population of younger age, lower income, and who live alone. The communities could utilize public facilities for people to have space for daily activities like study or work with safety guidelines.

A decrease in positivity is seen when the family number is 3 or more, and if there are COVID19 cases present in the residence, the mood is very negative. Therefore, the government should limit the number of people staying together and regulate the areas with cases present.

When correlated, younger people with lower income or living alone have more negative mood, and they should be advised to live with their parents or friends if possible. Furthermore, more younger people are diagnosed with COVID19, possibly due to working at locations with high human traffic like grocery stores. Therefore, it is important to strictly establish safety guidelines in crowded public spaces.

For the contextual variables, any degree of physical activity can induce positive mood, but more exercise makes one less activated, especially for older people. For sleep, less or more of it makes mood more alert, but the same amount of sleep results in a neutrally positive mood. Especially for younger people, less sleep can make mood very alert and negative, so it’s important to have a consistent amount of sleep. Social contact surprisingly has little impact, but it generally induces positive mood.

For work, reduced work, increased work, or being fired can be deactivating; Lower income groups are prone to be fired as no other groups have such data; Finding new work is exciting especially for young people; Stable work makes one generally positive and glad; Lastly, remote work is generally more deactivating. Hence, it’s important to have measures to financially support people who lose their job and companies which are struggling, provide more opportunities for young people, and give out suggestions on how to make remote work more exciting.

Thank you!