The present study is based on the assumption that the figure size of young children’s drawings of themselves is mediated by cultural conceptions of the self. It was hypothesized that Cameroonian rural children, developing predominantly an interdependent self-conception, draw themselves alone and in a family picture smaller than urban German children, who predominantly develop an independent self-conception. A total of 570 preschool children were recruited from Cameroonian Nso-farmer families and German middle-class families. Drawings of 76 Cameroonian and 72 German children, matched for age, graphical competence, developmental stage, and structural level of human figure drawing (tadpoles, transitional drawings, and conventional human figure drawings), were entered into final analyses. According to our hypothesis, the figure size as well as the head size of Cameroonian children’s drawings are substantially smaller compared to the drawings of German children. Results are discussed in regard to the cognitive size of the self, which is mediated differently by different cultural contexts.
Ahnert, L., Kraetzig, S., Meischner, T., & Schmidt, A. ( 1994). Sozialisationskonzepte fuer Kleinkinder: Wirkungen tradierter Erziehungsvorstellungen und staatssozialistischer Erziehungsdoktrinen im intraund interkulturellen Ost-West-Vergleich. In G. Trommsdorff (Ed.), Psychologische Aspekte des sozio-politischen Wandels in Ostdeutschland. (pp. 94-110). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
2.
Andersson, S.B. ( 1995). Social scaling in children’s family drawings: A comparative study in three cultures. Child Study Journal, 25(2), 97-121.
3.
Arnheim, R. ( 1980). The puzzle of Nadia’s drawings. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 7, 79-85.
4.
Benveniste, D. ( 1983). The archetypal image of the mouth and its relation to autism. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 10, 99-112.
5.
CIA World Fact Book. (2003/ 2007). The World Fact Book. Retrieved August 1, 2009, from https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html
6.
Cohen, J. ( 1960). A coefficient of agreement for nominal scales. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 20, 37-46.
7.
Cox, M. ( 1993). Children’s drawings of the human figure. Howe, East Sussex, United Kingdom: Lawrence Erlbaum .
8.
Cox, M. ( 2005). The pictorial world of the child. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
9.
Cox, M., & Parkin, C.E. ( 1986). Children’s depictions of different views off the human figure. Educational Psychology, 16, 133-137.
10.
Cox, M.V., Perara, J., Koyasu, M., & Hiranuma, H. ( 2001). Children’s human figure drawings in the UK and Japan: The effects of age, sex and culture. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 19, 275-292.
11.
Cromer, R.F. ( 1983). Hierarchical planning disability in the drawings and constructions or a special group of several aphasic children. Brain and Cognition, 2, 144-164.
12.
Dennis, W. ( 1960). The human figure drawing of Bedouins. Journal of Social Psychology, 52, 209-219.
13.
Disabled World. (2008). Retrieved August 1, 2009, from http://www.disabled-world.com/artman/publish/height-chart.shtml
14.
Gardner, H. ( 1980). Artful scribbles: The significance of children’s drawings. New York: Basic Books .
15.
Geertz, C. ( 1975). On the nature of anthropological understanding. American Scientist, 63, 47-53.
16.
Golomb, C. ( 1974). Young children’s sculpture and drawing. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
17.
Golomb, C., & Farmer, D. ( 1983). Children’s graphic planning strategies and early principles of spatial organization in drawings. Studies in Art Education, 24(2), 86-100.
18.
Goodenough, F.L. ( 1926). Measurement of intelligence by drawings. New York: World Book.
19.
Goodnow, J.J. ( 1977). Children drawing. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
20.
Greenfield, P.M., Keller, H., Fuligni, A., & Maynard, A. ( 2003). Cultural pathways through universal development. Annual Review of Psychology, 54, 461-490.
21.
Hall, E.T. ( 1966). The hidden dimension. Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
22.
Harris, D.B. ( 1963). Children’s drawings as measures of intellectual maturity. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World.
23.
Kağitçibaşi, C. (2007). Family, self, and human development across countries. Theory and applications (2nd ed.). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum .
24.
Keller, H. ( 2003). Socialization for competence: Cultural models of infancy . Human Development, 46(5), 288-311.
25.
Keller, H. ( 2007). Cultures of infancy. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
26.
Keller, H., & Demuth, C. ( 2005). Further explorations of the "Western mind". Mothers’ and grandmothers’ parental ethnotheories in Los Angeles, California, and Berlin, Germany. Forum Qualitative Social Research, 7(1), Article 5. Available at http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs-texte/1-06/06-1-5-e.htm
27.
Keller, H., & Greenfield, P.M. (2000). History and future of development in cross-cultural psychology. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology , 31(1), 52-62.
28.
Keller, H., Kärtner, J., Borke, J., Yovsi, R.D., & Kleis, A. ( 2005). Parenting styles and the development of the categorical self. A longitudinal study on mirror self recognition in Cameroonian Nso farming and German families. International Journal of Behavioral Development , 29(6), 496-504.
29.
Keller, H., Lohaus, A., Kuensemueller, P., Abels, M., Yovsi, R.D., Voelker, S., et al. (2004). The bio-culture of parenting: Evidence from five cultural communities. Parenting: Science and Practice , 4(1), 25-50.
30.
Keller, H., Voelker, S., & Yovsi, R.D. ( 2005). Conceptions of parenting in different cultural communities. The case of West African Nso and Northern German women. Social Development, 14(1), 158-180.
31.
Keller, H., Yovsi, R.D., Borke, J., Kärtner, J., Jensen, H., & Papaligoura, Z. (2004). Developmental consequences of early parenting experiences: Self regulation and self recognition in three cultural communities. Child Development, 75(6), 1745-1760.
32.
Koppitz, E.M. ( 1968). Psychological evaluation of children’s human figure drawings. New York: Grune & Stratton.
33.
Landis, J.R., & Koch, G.G. ( 1977). The measurement of observer agreement for categorical data. Biometrics, 33(1), 159-174.
34.
Lange-Kuettner, C., & Thomas G. V. (Eds.). (1995). A neo-Piagetian approach to children’s drawings. London: Harvester.
35.
LeVine, R.A., & Norman, K. ( 2001). The infant’s acquisition of culture: Early attachment reexamined in anthropological perspective. In C. C. Moore & H. F. Mathews (Eds.), The psychology of cultural experience (pp. 83-104). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
36.
Machover, K. ( 1949). Personality projection in the drawings of the human figure . Springfield, IL: C. C. Thomas .
37.
Markus, H.R., & Kitayama, S. ( 1991). Culture and the self. Implications for cognition, emotion and motivation. Psychological Review, 98, 224-253.
38.
Markus, H.R., & Kitayama, S. ( 1994). The cultural construction of self and emotion. Implications for social behavior. In S. Kitayama & H. R. Markus (Eds.), Emotion and culture: Empirical studies of mutual influence (pp. 89-130). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
39.
Matthews, J. ( 1999). The art of childhood and adolescence. London: Falmer.
40.
Meili-Dworetzki, G. ( 1981). Kulturelle Bedingungen des Zeichenstils und seines Wandels . In K. Foppa & R. Groner (Eds.), Kognitive Strukturen und ihre Entwicklung (pp. 80-118). Bern, Germany: Huber.
41.
Meili-Dworetzki, G. ( 1982). Spielarten des Menschenbildes. Ein Vergleich der Menschzeichnungen japanischer und schweizerischer Kinder. [Varieties of concepts of man. A comparison of human figure drawings of humans of Japanese and Swiss children]. Bern, Germany: Huber.
42.
Müller, R. ( 2000). Kinderzeichnungen interkulturell [Children’s drawings cross-culturally]. Kunst und Unterricht, 246/247, 60-65.
43.
Nsamenang, A.B. ( 1992). Human development in cultural context: A third world perspective. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
Schoenmackers, H. ( 1996). Die Menschzeichnung dreijähriger Kinder [Human figure drawing in three years old children]. Frankfurt, Germany: Lang.
46.
Statistisches Bundesamt (2007). Geburten in Deutschland [Birth rates in Germany]. Retrieved August 1, 2009, from http://www.destatis.de/jetspeed/portal/cms/Sites/destatis/Internet/DE/Content/Publikationen/Fachveroeffentlichungen/Bevoelkerung/BroschuereGeburtenDeutschland.psml .
47.
Wang, Q. ( 2004). The emergence of cultural self-constructs: Autobiographical memory and self-description in European American and Chinese children. Developmental Psychology, 40(1), 3-15.
48.
Wilson, M., & Wilson, B. ( 1976). Visual narrative and the artistically gifted. Gifted Child Quarterly, 20(2), 432-447.
49.
Wolter, H. ( 2007). Kinderzeichnungen. Empirische Forschungen und Interkulturalität unter besonderer Berücksichtigung von Ghana [Children’s drawings. Empirical studies and cultural diversity in special consideration of Ghana]Unpublished doctoral dissertation. , University of Paderborn, Germany.
50.
Yovsi, R.D. ( 2003). An investigation of breastfeeding and mother-infant interactions in the face of cultural taboos and belief systems. The case of Nso and Fulani mothers and their infants of 3-5 months of age in Mbvem, sub-division of the North-west province of Cameroon. Münster, Germany: Lit.
