Graphicacy

Graphicacy is defined as the ability to understand and present information in the form of sketches, photographs, diagrams, maps, plans, charts, graphs and other non-textual, two-dimensional formats. The word graphicacy was coined by Balchin and Coleman as representation of the visuo-spatial abilities, they gave their reasons as follows "In the choice of a word to denote the educated counterpart of visual-spatial ability one must first ask the question what exactly does this form of communication involve. It is fundamentally the communication of spatial information that cannot be conveyed adequately by verbal or numerical means,e.g. the plan of a town, the pattern of a drainage network or a picture of a distant place - in other words the whole field of the graphic arts and much of geography cartography, computer-graphics, photography, itself. All of these words contain the syllable "graph" which seemed a logical stem for "graphicacy" which was completed by analogy with literacy, numeracy and articulacy.