Abstract
The ability of children, adolescents, and adults to analyze the content, formal, and affective dimensions of paintings was determined by asking subjects to describe similarities and differences between paintings. Content or subject matter was an important criterion of similarity for all subjects but was most salient for the preoperational aged children. Content can be regarded as the surface structure of the painting because its perception involves a direct correspondence between physical objects and events and their pictorial representations. Older children, adolescents, and adults operating at higher levels of cognitive development mentioned similarities in formal qualities such as line, shape, style, etc., and in affective or emotional qualities more often than did the younger children. Formal and affective dimensions can be regarded as the deep structure of the painting, since the perception of these elements requires the understanding that paintings also represent ideas, feelings, and experiences about reality.
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This article evolved from a study that was done by the first author to fulfill the research apprenticeship requirement for the doctoral degree. The authors would like to extend their thanks and appreciation to Patty Williams and Marla Shoemaker, art educators at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and to Ruth Fine of the Alverthorpe Gallery in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania, for their valuable assistance in the planning and design of the study. The authors would also like to thank Tessa Lamont and Antonia D’Onofrio for their help in rating the subjects’ responses.
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Kenney, J.L., Nodine, C.F. Developmental changes in sensitivity to the content, formal, and affective dimensions of paintings. Bull. Psychon. Soc. 14, 463–466 (1979). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03329512
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03329512