Seeing Identity in Data: Can Anthropographics Uncover Racial Homophily in Emotional Responses?

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Sukumar, Poorna Talkad, Porfiri, Maurizio, Nov, Oded
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Sukumar, Poorna Talkad
Porfiri, Maurizio
Nov, Oded
author_facet Sukumar, Poorna Talkad
Porfiri, Maurizio
Nov, Oded
contents Racial homophily refers to the tendency of individuals to associate with others of the same racial or ethnic background. A recent study found no evidence of racial homophily in responses to mass shooting data visualizations. To increase the likelihood of detecting an effect, we redesigned the experiment by replacing bar charts with anthropographics and expanding the sample size. In a crowdsourced study (N=720), we showed participants a pictograph of mass shooting victims in the United States, with victims from one of three racial groups (Hispanic, Black, or White) highlighted. Each participant was assigned a visualization highlighting either their own racial group or a different racial group, allowing us to assess the influence of racial concordance on changes in affect (emotion). We found that, across all conditions, racial concordance had a modest but significant effect on changes in affect, with participants experiencing greater negative affect change when viewing visualizations highlighting their own race. This study provides initial evidence that racial homophily can emerge in responses to data visualizations, particularly when using anthropographics.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2509_09910
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Seeing Identity in Data: Can Anthropographics Uncover Racial Homophily in Emotional Responses?
Sukumar, Poorna Talkad
Porfiri, Maurizio
Nov, Oded
Human-Computer Interaction
Racial homophily refers to the tendency of individuals to associate with others of the same racial or ethnic background. A recent study found no evidence of racial homophily in responses to mass shooting data visualizations. To increase the likelihood of detecting an effect, we redesigned the experiment by replacing bar charts with anthropographics and expanding the sample size. In a crowdsourced study (N=720), we showed participants a pictograph of mass shooting victims in the United States, with victims from one of three racial groups (Hispanic, Black, or White) highlighted. Each participant was assigned a visualization highlighting either their own racial group or a different racial group, allowing us to assess the influence of racial concordance on changes in affect (emotion). We found that, across all conditions, racial concordance had a modest but significant effect on changes in affect, with participants experiencing greater negative affect change when viewing visualizations highlighting their own race. This study provides initial evidence that racial homophily can emerge in responses to data visualizations, particularly when using anthropographics.
title Seeing Identity in Data: Can Anthropographics Uncover Racial Homophily in Emotional Responses?
topic Human-Computer Interaction
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.09910