Individual Differences in Concept Learning of Painting Styles

Abstract

52 male and female adults were given a concept-learning task involving abstract and representational painting styles. The task involved learning to recognize new instances of artists' paintings on the basis of exposure to previous exemplars. Subjects were also given Cattell's 16 PF, Meier's Art Judgment Test, and the Quick Test (to assess intelligence). Results indicated that learning of both painting styles occurred, although the ability to learn one type of art did not predict the degree of success at learning the other. The ability to learn abstract versus representational styles was related to different individual-difference variables, although correlations were generally low. Learning abstract styles was correlated with self-conflict and tension while learning representational art was correlated with measures of self-assuredness and good esthetic judgment.