Children value realistic art more than abstract, both in others’ work and in their own. While all children start out as enthusiastic artists, as they get older they increasingly measure the success of their drawings by how realistic they have made them.

Although younger children tend to over-estimate their abilities in art, in line with the way they generally view other abilities, slightly older children who are more advanced in their drawing tend to be less satisfied with the end result because they see it as falling short of the visually realistic standards they have set in their minds.

The fact that children from the age of nine tend to stop drawing outside school, become more self-conscious about their work and often avoid drawing for the rest of their lives, indicates that schools need to adjust the way they approach art, researchers suggest. Children should learn the basics of drawing in a realistic style but they should also be taught to appreciate other, less representational, ways of drawing.

The Relationship between Production and Comprehension in Drawing by Richard P Jolley, Emma L Knox and Rachel Wainwright, Dept of Psychology, School of Sciences, Staffordshire University, College Road, Stoke on Trent ST4 2DE