Project 1- Map Proposal – Course Hub: GeoVisMaps

For the map I plan on creating for project one, I plan to produce a 2-D map that displays the effects of immigration patterns on breast cancer population today. I believe that looking into immigration data from Eastern Europe and some of the Middle East, and correlating it to modern breast cancer population around large metropolitan areas such as NYC, Washington DC, and San Francisco. I plan on using graytone county markers to describe the immigration levels in percent of population lineating from both Eastern Europe and specific areas of the Middle East. I will also use symbols to denote what I find to show a strong correlation between immigration populous vs. breast cancer population. The end goal of this map is to get a better understanding of how important the BRCA gene is in breast cancer population and how it has been propagated and spread throughout the US public over time.

Ryan Brazell (Admin) says:

February 18, 2016 at 11:17 am

This sounds like an ambitious plan, Robby! One question I have would be: how do you plan to make it clear to viewers that this is a map of correlation, not causation? When you say this is a map that will “display the effect of immigration patterns on breast cancer,” that suggests immigration is responsible for breast cancer. You would need more data than just immigration data and breast cancer population percentages to make that claim, though. Unless you make the difference between correlation and causation clear, this map could end up being very misleading.