Machover's figure-drawing test was administered to two groups of college students (n = 295) to determine the influence of recent experience on test performance. Ss taking an introductory anthropology course drew significantly more “novel” figures than did Ss enrolled in introductory psychology. The nature of the figures drawn by the anthropology group suggested that they were largely a function of exposure to course content, e.g., cavemen, Indians, etc., in a variety of “primitive” settings. It was concluded that recent experience should be considered before inferences of “pathology” are derived from performance on Machover's test.
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