It has been known for some time that children have particular difficulty drawing lines that are not perpendicular. But this difficulty has not been studied systematically. By systematically varying, in three experiments, the baseline, the response, and the kind of figures to be copied, we showed that the tendency to draw angles as more perpendicular than they actually are is a general one which occurs as much with abstract as with meaningful material and with radically different responses. We also discovered an unexpected effect, the vertical effect, which takes the form of the error occurring much less when a vertical baseline is involved than with other baselines.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
FreemanN H, 1975“Do children draw men with arms coming out of the head?”Nature254416–417
2.
LibenL S, 1974“Operative understanding of horizontality and its relationship to long term memory”Child Development45416–424
3.
MackayC KBrazendaleA HWilsonL R, 1972“Concepts of horizontal and vertical”Developmental Psychology7232–237
4.
PiagetJInhelderB, 1956The Childs Conception of Space (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul)
5.
SternW, 1909“Über verlagte Raumformen”Zeitschrift für experimentelle und angewandte Psychologie2498–526 [cited in Howard I P, Templeton W B, 1966 Human Spatial Orientation (London: John Wiley)]
6.
ThomasHJamisonW, 1975“On the acquisition of understanding that still water is horizontal”Merrill Palmer Quarterly2131–44
7.
WitkinH ADykR BFatersonH FGoodenoughD RKerpS A, 1962Psychological Differentiation (New York: John Wiley)
