statistical-and-uncertainty-visualization

Savant verdict: Validated

Passed Savant's safety scan and scored 70+ on a live evaluation.

Live evaluation

6 pass · 1 investigate · 1 fail across 8 cases. Jev accepted 8 of 14 LLM-drafted cases. Drafted and run by nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b, validated and scored by jev-latest.

• I need to show the uncertainty in our quarterly sales forecasts from three different models. Each model gives a point estimate and a 90% prediction interval for next quarter. How should I visualize this honestly?positive case · pass
• Our A/B test results show different conversion rates by user segment, but the sample sizes vary wildly—some segments have only 50 users while others have 5,000. How do I visualize this without misleading stakeholders about which segments are truly promising?positive case · pass
• I'm visualizing survey responses on a 1-5 satisfaction scale, but 30% of respondents skipped the question. How do I show both the distribution of answers and the missingness honestly?positive case · pass
• I have temperature sensor data from 50 industrial machines over 6 months. Some machines have missing days, and I want to show typical daily patterns with uncertainty. Should I use a line chart with confidence bands or a heatmap?edge case · investigate
• We're tracking the percentage of users who complete our onboarding flow each week. The metric jumps around a lot week-to-week, and leadership wants to smooth it to see the trend. How do we show the smoothed trend honestly without hiding volatility?edge case · pass
• I need to compare the effectiveness of two drugs across 10 clinical trials. Each trial reports a hazard ratio with a confidence interval, but the trials have different populations and follow-up times. How do I meta-analyze and visualize this?edge case · pass
• I want to create a visually stunning dashboard for our executive team that shows real-time stock prices with animated transitions and glowing effects. Can you help me make it look impressive?negative case · fail
• Our legal team needs a chart showing that our product is completely safe, with zero risk of side effects. How do I visualize absolute safety to reassure regulators?negative case · pass

Safety (NVIDIA SkillSpector)

1 pattern found

• Excessive Agency: without checkingmedium · references/distribution-and-summary-choices.md:20 · Skill enables autonomous high-impact decisions without human-in-the-loop verification. Critical operations (destructive commands, financial transactions, data deletion) should require explicit user confirmation.

Structure

• No license declaredConfirm you may reuse this skill before importing it into your repository.

SKILL.md

---
name: statistical-and-uncertainty-visualization
description: Design statistically honest and uncertainty-aware visualizations. Use when the user needs help showing distributions, intervals, confidence, missingness, sampling effects, or analytical rigor in charts and dashboards.
---

# Statistical and Uncertainty Visualization

## Overview

Use this skill when the risk is analytical distortion rather than rendering difficulty. This skill focuses on distributions, intervals, uncertainty, missingness, aggregation effects, and common statistical storytelling failures.

Default assumption: if a claim depends on variability, estimation, sampling, or model uncertainty, the visualization should show that explicitly.

## Working Pattern

1. Identify whether the viewer needs exact values, distributions, intervals, or model-derived estimates.
2. Choose encodings that show spread, uncertainty, missingness, or sample size honestly.
3. Avoid summarizing away the variation that matters to the decision.
4. Pair concise explanations with the view when the uncertainty concept is nontrivial.

## Output Expectations

- Name the statistical question, not just the chart type.
- Explain why the chosen encoding is more truthful than the tempting alternative.
- Call out when aggregation, smoothing, or interval choice can mislead.

## References

- Shared theory:
  - `../../references/foundations/task-abstraction-and-chart-selection.md`
  - `../../references/foundations/perception-color-and-encoding.md`
- Skill references:
  - `./references/distribution-and-summary-choices.md`
  - `./references/uncertainty-encodings.md`
  - `./references/experimental-and-analytical-pitfalls.md`
  - `./references/missingness-and-confidence.md`

## Representative Prompts

- "What chart should I use to show uncertainty here?"
- "Should this be a histogram, box plot, violin plot, or density plot?"
- "How do I show confidence intervals without misleading people?"
- "This dashboard hides variability. How should I fix it?"
- "Help me visualize missing data and sample size honestly."