Relationship between Directionality and Orientation in Drawings by Young Children and Adults

Abstract

The present study examined the relationship between directionality of drawing movements and the orientation of drawn products in right-handed adults and young children for 27 Japanese kindergartners and 29 Japanese university students who were asked to draw with each hand fishes in side view and circles from several starting points. Significant values of chi2 for distributions of frequencies of orientation of the fish drawings and the direction of circular drawing movement indicated that adult right-handers drawing the fish facing to the left tended to draw a circle clock-wise when they drew with the dominant hand, while there was no such significant relationship in young children's drawings. This result may suggest that the reading and writing habits may be implicated in the direction of drawing movements with the dominant hand, and this directional bias of drawing movement in the dominant hand can appear in the orientation of finished drawings.

Cultural Differences in Drawing Movements between Right-Handed Japanese and German Participants

“…As differences in drawing movements by the participants from the two countries were found only when the dominant hand was used, the findings of the present study supported the expectations and were consistent with the previous related studies (e.g., Vinter & Meulenbroek, 1993;Taguchi & Noma, 2005). Adults have been heavily exposed and accustomed to the writing habits of their languages, so the bias on the starting positions and directionality of drawing was likely well established for the dominant hand (Vaid, 1995).…”

“…Some researchers have suggested that reading and writing habits may influence fine motor skills such as writing and drawing movements (e.g., Vaid, Maharaj, Sakhuja, & Gupta, 2002;Fagard & Dahmen, 2003;Taguchi & Noma, 2005). Vaid, et al (2002) asked native readers of Hindi (a language read and written from left to right) and Urdu (a language read and written from right to left), ages 15 to 20 years, to draw five objects such as an arrow or a pencil, with the dominant hand, and observed the direction of the stroke employed in drawing.…”

“…Analysis showed that 85% of 100 figures produced by 20 right-handed Hindi readers were drawn from left to right while 67% of 100 figures produced by 20 right-handed Urdu readers were drawn from right to left. Taguchi and Noma (2005) reported that Japanese righthanded adults tended to draw a circle clockwise with the dominant hand, whereas Fagard and Dahmen (2003) stated that their right-handed French participants, ages 7 to 9 years, drew a circle counterclockwise. The directional bias of right-handed English schoolchildren and adults was also counterclockwise (Goodnow, Friedman, Bernbaum, & Lehman 1973;Van Sommer, 1984).…”

Asymmetries in representational drawing: Alternatives to a laterality account

“…An additional variable here may be that when using the right hand lateral movements are easier to make in a left to right direction. Taguchi and Noma (2005) studied 20 right-handed Japanese adults on a fish drawing and circle drawing task performed with each hand. They found an overall left facing bias which was stronger when the right hand was used; further, a relationship was found between left-facing of the fish and the use of a clockwise movement in circle drawing, but only when the right hand was used.…”

Automated Syntax Analyses of Drawing Two Tangent Patterns in Children with Low and Average Handwriting Ability

“…The circle was drawn counter-clockwise by the majority of children. This behavior of giving priority to counter-clockwise (CC) directionality over clockwise (C) has been frequently found in Western graphonomic studies for circle drawing ( van Sommers, 1989 ;Taguchi & Noma, 2005 ;Tabatabaey-Mashadi, et al ., 2013 ). The uniformity of circle drawing may also be related to its particular shape that is already established in principle within this age group.…”