When people picture design, they judge the entire career path based on what they see. “It’s nice.” “It’s not nice,” but almost never do people think, “This wasn’t easy to do,” or “This took some really creative and intelligent thinking to create.”
One aspect of design is visualizing tough topics without bias and without instilling emotions into people (unless that’s the intent, of course).
Of course, it’s not like anyone won’t even talk about it because you see charts and infographics all the time. Although the facts are crucial, the way we present them is important, as well. Remember that this information isn’t just dry data but something that has emotional weight.
Whenever you have someone reading an article that might be categorized as ‘sensitive,’ you have to assume that the person reading it won’t be overly casual about it. Rather, they’ll likely be stressed and anxious. And if your design amplifies these negative emotions, you’re making things even worse than they already are.
This article will focus on design, but specifically design choices that we, as designers, make daily, and how/what we can do to inform the reader without using suggestive colors and a cluttered layout, you can actually frustrate them.
Let’s see how not to make that happen.
How to Keep Visuals Clear and Respectful
Imagine if you were explaining something to a friend.
How would you do it?
You wouldn’t just blab anything, you’d pick your words carefully and use a calm tone of voice. Well, that’s how visuals should work. Quiet, clear visuals help people understand, and they don’t add additional weight to what they’re already feeling.
Here’s how to do that.
Keep the Visuals Calm
You already have a heavy topic, so is it really necessary to have visuals that make it even heavier? Probably not. If you go with super bright colors and a bold font, it’s like you’re shouting at the reader. You never want to do that, but especially not when it comes to a sensitive topic.
Softer, muted colors are a much better choice. When it comes to text, if you really need to use bold or italic text, use it only for the important parts, not the entire thing.
Keep in mind that information is what needs to be in focus, not design.
Use Color to Guide, Not Alarm
Many people associate the color red with danger, which means it really has no place in an article about a sensitive topic. Imagine a panicked/distressed person looking at splashes of red all over the visual; it could make them feel even worse.
Blues (especially greyish/soft tones) are great because they calm the person, while greens make the person feel more in tune with nature and generally positive because green is usually associated with ‘correct’.
Use color as a way to help readers find their way, not as a trigger.
Slow the Reader Down with Layout
One huge blob of text? Who’s going to bother with reading that?
Readers’ first instinct will be to skip it or, if you’re lucky, they’ll skim through it.
Neither is really what you want. You want enough spacing to defeat the monotonous’ wall of text. You want to break the text into readable/digestible paragraphs. Otherwise, it’s VERY difficult to read.
You can further break information into even smaller chunks using headings. This way, the layout won’t force the reader to stop; it will give them natural pauses. The whole piece will be a lot more manageable.
Clearly Acknowledge Local Differences
If you’re talking about rules and resources, you need to acknowledge the fact that they change from place to place. You can’t show every single difference because that would make the text too long, but what you can do is to use the location as an example.
And here’s a quick example of how to do that:
You can take something like ‘sexual assault survival rates,’ and you want to break this information down by state.
In a state like California, the system is organized by county, which enables easy creation of visuals that point to local centres.
Then you can put Maryland next to it, whose resources are more organized at the state level. You can acknowledge that difference when talking about legal options available to survivors in Maryland and then show it in a clean flowchart.
Visuals Should Explain, Not Provoke
Your piece is sure to get a lot of attention with a shocking photo, but it can also have a different effect. It can shock someone right off the page! When the person is already upset, they don’t want to deal with a graphic image because it will make it impossible to focus on finding the information they need.
Make sure that your visuals explain. If they force a reaction, that’s not good.
Forcing emotion/reaction = bad.
Unbiased facts = Good.
Conclusion
If you were to sum all of this up, then it would be something like this: when it comes to visualizing sensitive topics, the goal is to make empathy visible. Yes, you’re explaining complicated information, but at the same time, you feel for that person.
Keep it calm and clear, that’s all you need to do.
Bold colors and shock value have their place for sure, but it’s not this.