Analytical and Empirical Evaluation of Color Schemes in Temperature Maps

The communication of weather and climate phenomena plays an important role in everyday life as well as in current debates. This article focuses on the representation of absolute temperatures in selected temperature maps from media and official sources. Its core objective is to analyze the usability of color schemes. An analytical and an empirical study were conducted to evaluate the usability of the color schemes. Specifically, the intuitive recognition of graphical sequence, association between values and meaning, differentiation of colors, and aesthetics were considered. Special emphasis was placed on users with color vision deficiencies. The studies identified several weaknesses in the color schemes—sometimes with contradictory findings, such as high subjective approval of readability versus poor effectiveness. These conclusions served as the basis for developing a new scheme to be proposed for future use.