Abstract. Earthquake models can produce aftershock forecasts, which have recently been released to lay audiences following large earthquakes. While visualization literature suggests that displaying forecast uncertainty can improve how forecast maps are used, research on uncertainty visualization is missing from earthquake science. We designed a pre-registered online experiment to test the effectiveness of three visualization techniques for displaying aftershock forecast maps and their uncertainty. These maps showed the forecasted number of aftershocks at each location for a week following a hypothetical mainshock, along with the uncertainty around each location’s forecast. Three different uncertainty visualizations were produced: (1) forecast and uncertainty maps adjacent to one another; (2) the forecast map depicted in a color scheme, with the uncertainty shown by the transparency of the color; and (3) two maps that showed the lower and upper bounds of the forecast distribution at each location. Unlike previous experiments, we compared the three uncertainty visualizations using tasks that are systematically designed to address broadly applicable and user-generated communication goals. We compared task responses between participants using uncertainty visualizations and using the forecast map shown without its uncertainty (the current practice). Participants completed two map-reading tasks that targeted several dimensions of the readability of uncertainty visualizations. Participants then performed a comparative judgment task, which demonstrated whether a visualization was successful in reaching two key communication goals: indicating where many aftershocks and no aftershocks are likely (sure bets) and where the forecast is low but the uncertainty is high enough to imply potential risk (surprises). All visualizations performed equally well in the goal of communicating sure bet situations. But the visualization with lower and upper bounds was substantially better than the other designs at communicating surprises. These results have implications for the communication of forecast uncertainty both within and beyond earthquake science.

中文翻译：

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余震预报图的有效不确定性可视化

摘要。地震模型可以产生余震预报，这些预报最近已在大地震后发布给普通观众。虽然可视化文献表明显示预测不确定性可以改善预测地图的使用方式，但地震科学中缺少对不确定性可视化的研究。我们设计了一个预先注册的在线实验来测试三种可视化技术在显示余震预报图及其不确定性方面的有效性。这些地图显示了假设的主震后一周内每个位置的余震预测数量，以及每个位置预测的不确定性。产生了三种不同的不确定性可视化：(1) 预测图和不确定性图彼此相邻；(2) 以配色方案描绘的预测图，颜色的透明度显示出不确定性；(3) 两张地图，显示了每个位置的预测分布的下限和上限。与之前的实验不同，我们使用系统设计的任务来比较三种不确定性可视化，以解决广泛适用和用户生成的通信目标。我们使用不确定性可视化和使用显示的没有不确定性的预测图（当前做法）比较了参与者之间的任务响应。参与者完成了两项地图阅读任务，这些任务针对不确定性可视化的可读性的几个维度。然后，参与者执行了一项比较判断任务，该任务证明了可视化是否成功实现了两个关键的沟通目标：表明可能有很多余震和没有余震的地方（肯定的赌注）以及预测低但不确定性高到足以暗示潜在风险（惊喜）的地方。在传达确定的投注情况这一目标上，所有的可视化效果都同样出色。但是在传达惊喜方面，具有下限和上限的可视化比其他​​设计要好得多。这些结果对地震科学内外的预测不确定性的交流都有影响。