Links between Literacy Skills and Accurate Spatial Relations in Representations of the Face: Comparison of Preschoolers,School Children,Dyslexics,and Mentally Retarded

Abstract

A specific link is found between low of absent literacy skills and a specific misrepresentation of spatial relations exclusively of the upper part of the human face. This misrepresentation, determined by simple measurement, is found in 32% of the pictorial representations of 407 preschoolers whose drawings were published by various authors as well as in 32% of 44 preschoolers tested here. By contrast, after having had instruction in literacy, the proportion of such misrepresentations of the face drops to 7.5% and 10%, respectively, although, as expected, not in the drawings by 236 mildly mentally retarded or by 297 dyslexic children, 33% and 39% of whom, respectively, still misrepresent the face. In addition to a developmental factor, a further one, as yet undetermined, may be at work and related to a specific deficit in representing the spatial relations of the face. Data further support the previously suggested existence of a specific and general trend for a link between literacy skills and accurate representation of the spatial relations of the pattern of the face also noted previously in diverse cultural groups and periods.