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Decomposing and connecting objectrepresentations in 5- to 9-year-old children’sdrawing behaviour

Delphine Picard1* and Annie Vinter21Department of Psychology, University of Montpellier III, France2L.E.A.D., University of Bourgogne, France

This study aimed at specifying the content of the representational redescription (RR)process assumed by Karmiloff-Smith (1992) with respect to the emergence of inter-representational flexibility in children’s drawing behaviour. We hypothesized that theRR process included part-whole decomposition processes that are essential to theability to produce cross-categorical drawings. We presented 5- to 9-year-old childrenwith either a two-part (TP) or a several-part (SP) decomposition task involving a houseand a man (experimental conditions) or with no such decomposition task (controlcondition), prior to a connection task (drawing a man-house). The results showed thatconnection performances were better in children who had previously decomposed theobjects into two parts than in children assigned to the control group. This positive‘priming’ effect was attributed to the activation of part-whole analysis processes thatfurther facilitated the management of complex connections between the objects.

From a domain-general perspective, drawing has been used to study internal

representational changes and to reveal the constraints acting on such changes. Since

Karmiloff-Smith’s (1990) pioneering work on children’s drawings of ‘non-existent

objects’, much interest has been devoted to the study of children’s ability to produce

representational innovations in their drawings. Challenging children to innovate elicits

considerable modifications of their internal object representations. The extent to which

children can transform their internal representations was taken as valuable evidence ofthe degree of representational flexibility present at that age.

Karmiloff-Smith (1990) asked children who had acquired full behavioural control of

the drawing of some familiar objects to introduce innovations in their habitual way of

drawing (drawing ‘non-existent objects’). She showed that changes introduced by the

young children (4–6 years) involved deletions and changes in size and shape of

elements, whereas older children (8–10 years) changed position and orientation of

* Correspondence should be addressed to Delphine Picard, Department of Psychology, University of Montpellier III, Route deMende, 34199 Montpellier, France (e-mail: delphine.picard@univ-montp3.fr).

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British Journal of Developmental Psychology (2006), 24, 529–545

q 2006 The British Psychological Society

www.bpsjournals.co.uk

DOI:10.1348/026151005X49836

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elements and added elements from other conceptual categories. Fitting into her

developmental model, Karmiloff-Smith (1992) accounted for data collected in her

drawing experiment in terms of a transition from an implicit to an explicit level of

knowledge. The implicit level (I level) corresponds to the phase where children possess

well-established graphic routines that are run following a sequentially fixed sequence of

elements. Knowledge embedded in the routines is not consciously accessible.The explicit level (E level) is attained when graphic routines become flexible and open

to each other. This transition occurs through what she called a representational

redescription (RR) process, an endogenous process that intervenes once the child has

reached behavioural mastery in one domain. The RR process progressively releases the

graphic routines from two constraints present at the I level: a constraint of

independence, occurring between routines (so that they cannot share common pieces

of knowledge), and a constraint of sequentiality, occurring within a routine (so that it

cannot be run with deviations from its sequential schema). The RR model postulatesthat explicit representations follow a three steps path, with their components being first

available as data structure (E1 representations), then being consciously accessible

(E2 representations), and finally open to verbal report (E3 representations).

Replications of Karmiloff-Smith’s original (1990) study (Berti & Freeman, 1997;

Spensley & Taylor, 1999; Vinter & Picard, 1996; Zhi, Thomas, & Robinson, 1997) have

confirmed the existence of two main types of representational flexibility. An intra-

representational flexibility, present at an early age (4–5 years), is related to changes

which are restricted to the components of a given graphic representation. This earlytype of representational flexibility evolves from element-based modifications (5 years) to

whole (7 years) and part-whole-based (9 years) modifications of the habitual schema of

drawing (see Spensley & Taylor, 1999; Vinter & Picard, 1996). A second type of

flexibility, called inter-representational, is involved in the connection, within a single

drawing, of components belonging to at least two different categories of object.

For instance, children may produce a house with components of a human figure

(e.g. internal features), of a bird (e.g. wings), or of other familiar objects. The end

product results in original drawings demonstrating the crossing of categoricalboundaries within the representational system. This specific kind of behavioural

flexibility emerges later in development, at around 9–10 years. Studies using Karmiloff-

Smith’s innovation paradigm point to a sequential development of representational

flexibility, from an intra- to an inter-representational level.

However, some findings have cast doubt on the fact that inter-representational

flexibility emerges only from 9 years of age. Giving young children very precise

instructions (and specific examples), Spensley and Taylor (1999) demonstrated that

4-year-old children were able to produce inter-representational changes that wereobtained only at 9 years with Karmiloff-Smith’s (1990) original instructions. These

authors asked 4- to 6-year-old children to draw a ‘man with some parts being replaced

with parts of an animal’, providing the youngest children with specific examples

(e.g. ‘a man with wings instead of arms’). The results indicated that all the children

succeeded in the task, by introducing the animal component into their drawing of a man.

The youngest children, however, persisted in reproducing the given example, whereas

the older children produced drawings from their own imagination. Clarifying the verbal

instructions used for a drawing task has previously been shown to enhance performance(see, for instance, Barrett, Beaumont, & Jennett, 1985; Barrett & Bridson, 1983; Beal &

Arnold, 1990). However, the reason for the success obtained by Spensley and Taylor

with very young children may be accounted for by the low level of representational

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reworking required to complete the task. This may explain why the young children did

not produce a drawing from their imagination, but simply did ‘what they were told to

do’ (Barrett et al., 1985).

Berti and Freeman (1997) asked 5-year-old children to draw a ‘man-house’ and an

‘animal-man’ in response to verbal naming, without providing them with any model.

They reported that 37 out of 46 children succeeded in the task for at least one of the twointer-representational drawings. Success was either ‘partial’ when the drawing could

not be considered as based on inter-representational changes, although modifications

had been introduced. Alternatively, it was judged to be ‘complete’ when inter-

representational changes were produced. Berti and Freeman further observed that

5-year-old children obtained better performances when drawing a ‘man-house’ (80.4%)

than an ‘animal-man’ (58.7%). They accounted for the data in terms of a greater facility in

connecting objects with dissimilar shapes than with similar ones. Whereas both the man

and the animal were formed essentially from smooth shapes, the components of the

house mainly involved the drawing of hard shapes. This study showed that inter-representational behaviours could, to a certain extent, be induced in young children

when the instructions are specified. However, the way these authors coded their results

was rather crude, in terms of ‘partial’ or ‘complete’ success. A more detailed analysis of

the drawings of the young children in terms of types of innovations produced would be

required before we can suggest that these young children behaved like the older

children studied in Karmiloff-Smith’s original experiment.

The present study investigated 5- to-9-year-old children’s ability to connect

representations of two objects in a single drawing when explicitly asked to (this

drawing task will be called the ‘connection task’ here). We used Berti and Freeman’sdrawing instruction of the man-house because it clearly requires transformation at the

representational level. Our main objective was to further explore the possibility that

young children can produce cross-categorical innovations in this task, hypothesizing on

the type of process that may be involved in the ability to produce inter-representational

flexibility. According to Karmiloff-Smith (1992), the RR process permits inter-

representational flexibility in drawing behaviour once it had sufficiently released the

constraints present at the I level of representations. However, the relations between the

RR process and the constraint of sequentiality have not yet been clearly established in

the literature. For instance, Barlow, Jolley, White, and Galbraith (2003) found noevidence to support the existence of procedural rigidity as an inhibitor of

representational flexibility. Moreover, the constraint of independence between

representations is unlikely to be sufficient to account in itself for the emergence of

inter-representational flexibility.

Understanding how inter-representational flexibility emerges could be addressed by

giving a much more precise content to the RR process. We propose that the RR process

is intimately associated with a process of part-whole decomposition of the internal

representations. Spensley and Taylor (1999) similarly argued that a ‘cross-category

insertion [: : :] requires a comparison of, for example, the overall organization of theparts of a man-drawing with the organization of the parts of a pig’, and ‘thus involves an

awareness of the relationships between the elements of two different animals at once’

(p. 320). The key process assumed here refers to a part-whole relation analysis process.

This is a process by which an internal representation can be decomposed into its

constituent parts with a conscious access on these parts and on the relations that the

constituent parts entertain with respect to the representation as a whole. Such a process

is thought to be conceptual in nature with highly flexible internal representations

Decomposing and connecting object representation 531

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(E1 level, at least). Note that Piaget and Inhelder (1956) claimed that children’s ability to

conceptualize the relations between parts and a whole develops mainly from the age of

7. Before this age, the pre-operational logical children cannot reliably coordinate two

separate pieces of information together in order to resolve a class inclusion task, for

instance, or other tasks that require understanding part-whole relations. Similarly,

Luquet’s (1927) theory of drawing development considered that children initially drawan outline to represent the whole of a topic, with later drawing development based on

separating out its constituent parts.

In our view, part-whole decomposition processes can be construed as being the

concern of the RR process. Karmiloff-Smith (1979) has shown that a direct focus on the

component parts of an object could elicit the transition from an I to an E level (E1 level,

at least) of representation in children. She studied the effect of component knowledge

(of a railway track) on 5- to-7-year-old children’s drawing of that topic. Children had to

first copy a railway model made of straight and curved pieces of track. Then, they wereasked to construct the model with all pieces at disposal, before copying the initial model

again. In line with the RR model account, Karmiloff-Smith (1979) demonstrated that

reflection on the component parts of the topic (as elicited by the intermediate

construction task) facilitated flexibility in drawing and the implicit–explicit shift.

In the present study, we hypothesized that if close relations between the ability to

manage part-whole relations and the ability to manage cross-category connections

exist, then a task devoted to the expression of the part-whole analysis should have a

positive impact on the performances obtained in a connection task. To test thehypothesis that a decomposition task may induce a kind of ‘priming’ effect, a between-

subjects design was used with three different conditions. Two experimental conditions

were defined, each being related to a particular decomposition instruction, and a

control condition was used for which no decomposition task was introduced prior to

the connection task. One instruction required the children to decompose drawings of

a man and a house into two parts; the other instruction required the decomposition of

the representations into more than two parts. The two-part (TP) and several-part (SP)

instructions were selected because they introduced different levels of complexity. Anobject can be decomposed into two parts by cutting it vertically or horizontally, in the

same way as cutting a picture with scissors. In contrast, decomposing an object into

several parts may be achieved through different processes of segmentation. An effect

of instruction could be expected. However, irrespective of the instruction, children

should achieve better performances in the connection task than those in the control

group. Furthermore, we expected clear age-related changes in both tasks in terms of

the degree of elaboration of the decompositions and connections.

Method

ParticipantsParticipants in the study were 135 right-handed children. They were divided into three

age groups of 5 years (N ¼ 45; mean age: 5.5), 7 years (N ¼ 45; mean age: 7.4), and

9 years (N ¼ 45; mean age: 9.5). An equal number of girls and boys were present in eachage group. None of these children was advanced or retarded with regard to schooling, or

suffered from any psychomotor drawing or handwriting disorders. The children were

from state kindergartens and primary schools in a middle-class area of a southern French

town.

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MaterialThe children were tested individually, seated at a table in a quiet area inside their school.

They drew with a normal pencil (HB) on a separate sheet of paper (21 £ 14.8 cm) for

each drawing.

Procedure and designThe experiment was divided into three phases. In the first phase, the children were

simply asked to draw a house and a man under simple evocation (free-drawing task). The

drawings were then put aside. These objects were selected because behavioural mastery

of such drawings is already attained at age 5 years. This free drawing task was used as a

baseline condition, to identify for each child the modification introduced in the

drawings in the decomposition and connection tasks.In the second phase, the children from each age group were assigned randomly to

one of the three following conditions. There were thus 15 children per age group and

condition. In the TP condition, the children were asked to decompose their graphic

representations into two parts. The following instruction was used: ‘Now, I’d like you to

draw a house (a man) in two separate parts that do not touch each other, so that when

you put them together, you get the whole object again. Can you draw a house (man) in

two parts?’ There were no time constraints for completing the drawing. The order of

presentation of the two objects was counterbalanced across participants. In the SPcondition, the children were asked to decompose their graphic representations into

several parts. The following instruction was used: ‘Now, I’d like you to draw a house

(a man) in several separate parts that do not touch each other, so that when you put them

together, you find the whole object again. Can you draw a house (a man) in several parts?’

There were no time constraints for completing the drawing, and the order of

presentation of the two objects was counterbalanced across subjects. In the control

condition, the children were not asked to perform any decomposition task. They were

not introduced directly to the connection task, because any difference between theexperimental and control groups could be due precisely to the fact that the children in

the experimental conditions drew the objects more frequently than those in the control

condition. The children were not told to draw the house and the man again because, as

demonstrated by Van Sommers (1984), the very fact of drawing an object in a free

condition restricts the innovations that children can subsequently bring to the drawing

of the same object. Any difference between the experimental and control groups could

thus be attributed to a lowest level of representational flexibility induced by the repeated

drawing of the two familiar objects in the control group. The solution we chose toimplement for the control group was to ask the children to draw two new but familiar

objects (a bunch of flowers and a car). These objects are also sufficiently complex to be

decomposed into parts and whole, in the same way as a house or a man. Overall, the

control children drew a similar number of items as those assigned to the experimental

conditions, while also drawing novel items in this second phase of the study without

suffering from any rigidity due to the repetition of drawing the house and the man.

In the last phase, we presented the connection task. All the children were asked to

produce a man-house, in response to the following instruction: ‘Now, I’d like you todraw a strange object, a man-house; that is, a house that has been transformed into a

man, so that it looks like a man. Can you draw a man-house?’ The time available to

complete the drawing was not restricted. Once the children had finished, they were

asked to comment on their pictures.

Decomposing and connecting object representation 533

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Coding of the drawingsThe modifications introduced by the children in the decomposition and connection

tasks were identified with reference to their free drawings, and on the basis of the verbal

comments given by children at the end of the session. With regard to the decomposition

task, a close examination of the children’s drawings revealed four types of decomposition,

depicted in Figure 1, one of them being observed only in the SP condition:

(1) No decomposition of the object (see Illustration 1 in Figure 1): the object was

unchanged (in comparison with the baseline drawings), or it was replicated entirely

or partially.

Figure 1. Illustrations of the types of decomposition obtained in the two-part (TP) and in the several-

part (SP) decomposition tasks.

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(2) Between-features decomposition of the object (see Illustration 2 in Figure 1): the

object was drawn in two or more parts, in such a way that the isolated parts included

entire features.

(3) Across-features decomposition of the object (see Illustration 3 in Figure 1): the object

was split into two parts about a vertical axis in such a way that the isolated parts

included split features.(4) Fragmentation of the whole object (see Illustration 4 in Figure 1): fragmented

drawings resulting from more or less regular pen lifts performed during the drawing

process, so that the drawing appeared in dotted lines.

Two independent judges coded the 90 collected drawings with reference to these

coding types, and full agreement was obtained.

With regard to the connection task, three main types of connections were found.

They are illustrated in Figure 2, in which the drawings exhibiting the simple andcomplex connections are presented together with the associated baseline man and

house drawings:

(1) No connection between the two object representations (see illustrations 1 in

Figure 2): no change from baseline drawings was observed so that only one object

was drawn, or the two objects were simply juxtaposed (see 1a) or superposed

(see 1b).

(2) Simple connection between the two objects (see Illustration 2 in Figure 2):features for one object were inserted in the other object (see 2a) or were replaced

with features from the other object (see 2b), with no further change being made to

the object.

(3) Complex connection between the two objects (see Illustration 3 in Figure 2): the

connection was achieved through a combination of feature insertion and feature

replacement (see 3a), or of feature insertion combined with object modifications

(deletion of features, change of number of features, change of position of features,

change of shape of features; see 3b), or of feature replacement combined withobject modifications, or of feature insertion and feature replacement combined

with object modifications (see 3c).

Three judges, who worked independently, performed the coding of the 135

drawings based on these mutually exclusive types. Disagreements between the judges

occurred on 14 drawings. These disagreements were all discussed and resolved before

data analysis.

Results

Decomposition of object representationsA score for decomposing the two objects was attributed to each drawing using a 3-point

scale for each decomposition task, with higher scores indicating more sophisticated

modifications. The different types of decompositions were ordered and scored as

followed: ‘no decomposition’ (1), ‘fragmentation’ (1.5), ‘between-features decompo-sition’ (2), and ‘across-features decomposition’ (3). The ‘across-features decompositions’

could, in fact, be considered as the most elaborate type of decomposition. They testified

to high-level planning abilities in the children since they required the conscious

management of the overall organization of the objects’ features and the continuous

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Figure 2. Illustrations of the types of connection obtained in the connection task.

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monitoring of the depiction process (i.e. a complete reorganization of the routine).

The ‘between-features decompositions’ consisted of segmenting the object in terms of its

conceptual features, which could have been achieved either taking account of the part-

whole relations or by successively focusing on the local features of the representations.

This type of decomposition could thus share strong similarities with the across-features

decompositions, but it could also be managed in a much simpler way. It was therefore, bydefault, considered as an ‘inferior’ type of decomposition. The fragmentations were rare

(they were produced only in response to the SP decomposition task) and simply indicated

the children’s ability to operate on the motor aspects of their depiction process (lifting the

pen during the drawing process). Note that inclusion or exclusion of scores for

‘fragmentations’ in the analysis did not change the main significant results.

Figure 3 presents the mean decomposing scores for each age, object and task. Kruskal-

Wallis tests indicated that the decomposing scores were higher at age 9, M ¼ 2:32,

SD ¼ 0:61, than at age 5, M ¼ 1:68, SD ¼ 0:64, for the house, x2ð1Þ ¼ 6:64, p , :01, but

not for the man, x2ð1Þ ¼ 1:36, p ¼ :24. The decomposition task (TP or SP) had a

significant impact on the scores for both the house, x2ð1Þ ¼ 11:72, p , :01, and the man,

x2ð1Þ ¼ 12:49, p , :01, with the scores being globally lower in the SP decomposition

task, M ¼ 1:77, SD ¼ 0:57, than in the TP decomposition task, M ¼ 2:30, SD ¼ 0:61.

The number of children producing the no decompositions was inferior at ages 7 and

9 than at age 5 for the house, N ¼ 3=60 at age 7 and 9 versus N ¼ 11=30 at age 5,

x2ð1Þ ¼ 15:27, p ¼ :01, as well as for the man, N ¼ 4=60 at ages 7 and 9 versus

N ¼ 11=30 at age 5, x2ð1Þ ¼ 11:56, p ¼ :01. The between-features decompositions

Figure 3. Mean score for decomposing per age, decomposition task, and object. TP, two-part;

SP, several-part.

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were no more frequent at age 5 than at the older ages for the house, N ¼ 10=30 at age 5

and N ¼ 27=60 at ages 7 and 9, x2ð1Þ ¼ 1:12, p ¼ :29, or for the man, N ¼ 11=30 at age

5 and N ¼ 31=60 at ages 7 and 9, x2ð1Þ ¼ 1:81, p ¼ :18. Similarly, fragmentations were

observed at all ages for the house, N ¼ 5 at age 5, N ¼ 6 at age 7, N ¼ 3 at age 9, and for

the man, N ¼ 2 at age 5, N ¼ 5 at age 7 and N ¼ 3 at age 9. By contrast, there were more

across-features decompositions at age 7 and 9 than at age 5 for the house, N ¼ 21=60 at

age 7 and 9 versus N ¼ 4=30 at age 5, x2ð1Þ ¼ 4:68, p ¼ :05, but not for the man,

N ¼ 17=60 at ages 7 and 9 versus N ¼ 6=30 at age 5, x2ð1Þ ¼ :73, p ¼ :39. The results

further indicated that the children produced fewer across-features decompositions in

the SP decomposition task than in the TP decomposition task for both the house (SP),

N ¼ 6=90 versus TP, N ¼ 19=90, x2ð1Þ ¼ 7:85, p ¼ :01, and the man (SP), N ¼ 5=90

versus TP, N ¼ 18=90, x2ð1Þ ¼ 8:42, p ¼ :01. At the same time, the children fragmented

the objects in the SP decomposition task, house, N ¼ 14=90, man, N ¼ 10=90; that is,

they performed a type of decomposition that was specifically elicited by this task.

A quantitative analysis of the extent to which the children decomposed their

drawings into parts was also performed measuring the number of separated parts in

each produced drawing. The fragmented drawings were excluded from this analysis.

A 3 (age) £ 2 (decomposition task) £ 2 (object) mixed ANOVA with age and

decomposition task as between-subjects factors and object as a within-subjects factor

was performed on the number of decomposed parts. Figure 4 presents the mean

number of decomposed parts for each age, object, and task.

The results revealed significant main effects associated with age and task, ps , :01,

but these effects were subsumed under the interaction of age and task, Fð2; 70Þ ¼ 8:15,

p , :001. Post hoc analyses (Scheffe tests) indicated that the number of decomposed

parts significantly increased between 5 and 7 years of age in the SP decomposition task

Figure 4. Mean number of decomposed parts per age, decomposition task, and object. TP, two-part;

SP, several-part.

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( p , :01), but not in the TP decomposition task ( p ¼ :96). At age 5, the children did not

decompose their drawings into more parts under the SP and the TP decomposition

requirements ( p ¼ :98), while the older age groups did ( p , :01). The results also

revealed that the number of decomposed parts was globally higher for the man than for

the house drawing, Fð1; 70Þ ¼ 9:11, p , :01. However, a significant interaction

between object and task, Fð1; 70Þ ¼ 11:90, p , :001, indicated that the difference wasonly observed in the SP decomposition task ( p , :01), not in the TP decomposition task

( p ¼ :98).

Connection of object representationsA score for connecting the two objects was attributed to each child using a 3-point scale,

with higher scores indicating more sophisticated modifications. The different types of

connections were ordered and scored as followed: ‘no connection’ (1), ‘simple

connection’ (2) and ‘complex connection’ (3). We expected the children assigned to the

prior decomposition tasks to perform better in the connecting task than those of the

control group. Figure 5 presents the mean connecting scores for each age and condition.

Kruskal-Wallis tests indicated that the connecting-scores were higher at age 7,

M ¼ 2:55, SD ¼ 0:59, than at age 5, M ¼ 2:0, SD ¼ 0:67, x2ð1Þ ¼ 14:75, p , :01, whilethey did not differ significantly between 7 and 9 years of age (p ¼ :99). As hypothesized,

the children assigned to the TP condition globally obtained higher scores, M ¼ 2:53,

SD ¼ 0:58, than those in the control group, M ¼ 2:20, SD ¼ :67, x2ð1Þ ¼ 4:44, p , :05.

However, when the test was run between the SP condition, M ¼ 2:42, SD ¼ 0:67, and

the control condition, M ¼ 2:20, SD ¼ 0:67, the difference failed to reach significance,

x2ð1Þ ¼ 2:85, p ¼ :09. The positive impact of a prior decomposition task on subsequent

connecting performances was thus restricted to the TP decomposition task.

Figure 5. Mean score for connecting per age and experimental condition. TP, two-part; SP, several-part.

Decomposing and connecting object representation 539

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Children aged 5 years produced drawings with no connections more frequently than

the older children, N ¼ 10=45 at age 5 versus N ¼ 7=90 at ages 7 and 9, x2ð1Þ ¼ 5:69,

p ¼ :01. Similarly, simple connections were produced more often at age 5 than at the

other ages, N ¼ 25=45 versus N ¼ 24=90 at ages 7 and 9, x2ð1Þ ¼ 10:83, p , :01.

By contrast, complex connections were less frequent at age 5 than in the 7- and 9-year-

old children, N ¼ 10=45 at age 5 versus N ¼ 59=90 at ages 7 and 9, x2ð1Þ ¼ 22:54,

p , :01. The results further indicated that the TP condition elicited more complex

connections (N ¼ 27 out of 45 drawings) than the control condition (N ¼ 17 out of 45

drawings; x2ð1Þ ¼ 4:45, p , :05). A very similar pattern was observed for the SP

condition (N ¼ 25 out of 45 drawings), but the difference between this and the control

condition failed to reach significance, x2ð1Þ ¼ 2:86, p ¼ :09.

Relations between decomposition and connection abilitiesWe investigated whether specific relations existed between decomposition and

connection abilities. To this aim, we crossed children’s connecting scores with their

decomposing scores (see Table 1). We have to point out that some children produced

different types of decomposition for the house or man-drawings and consequently

obtained different scores for the two objects. In these cases, they were given the higher

score. Note that we checked that the pattern of results remained globally the same when

considering each object separately.

The results from Table 1 show that 89% (72/81) of the connection abilities with

scores greater than or equal to 2 were associated with prior decomposition abilities,

whereas only 11% of scores greater than or equal to 2 (9/81) occurred in the absence of

such prior abilities. The same phenomenon could also be observed for each condition

considered separately: connection abilities coupled with prior decomposition abilities

occurred in 95% (40/42) and 82% (32/39) of the cases for the TP and SP conditions,

respectively. When the two conditions were taken together (TP and SP), a score of 3 for

decomposing was followed by a score of 3 for connecting in about 80% of cases (22/28),

whereas a score of 2 for decomposing was followed by a score of 3 for connecting in

only about 50% of cases (22/41), x2ð1Þ ¼ 4:82, p , :05. However, this result was only

observed for the TP condition, x2ð1Þ ¼ 4:63, p , :05, not for the SP condition,

x2ð1Þ ¼ :96, p ¼ :32.

Table 1. Distribution of the children as a function of their scores for decomposing the objects in two

parts (TP) and in several parts (SP) and their scores for connecting the objects

Connecting scores

Decomposing scores 1 2 3

1 TP 1 1 1SP 1 5 2

1.5 TP – – –SP 0 5 5

2 TP 1 10 9SP 5 3 13

3 TP 1 4 17SP 0 1 5

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It could be argued that the lack of specific associations between connecting and

decomposing abilities in children assigned to the SP condition is, at least partially, due to

our scoring system which under-estimates the importance of the between-features

decompositions (Score 2) in comparison with the across-features category (Score 3).

A quantitative scoring of the decomposed drawings revealed a significant increase with

age in the number of decomposed parts produced by in children in the SP condition.We therefore investigated whether children’s connecting scores varied with the number

of decomposed parts (see Table 2). Note that the analysis excluded the children who

produced fragmentations in the SP condition (N ¼ 14 out of 45). Children who

produced a different number of decomposed parts for the house or man-drawings were

given the higher number of decomposed parts. When the two conditions were taken

together (TP and SP), the results from Table 2 show that the children who decomposed

their drawings into more than two parts were not significantly more numerous on Score

3 for connecting the objects (12/17) than those who decomposed their drawings in twoparts only (31/48), x2ð1Þ , 1, p ¼ :87. The same conclusion was drawn when the

analysis was restricted to the SP condition ( p ¼ :94).

Discussion

The aim of our study was to suggest a more precise content for the RR process assumed by

Karmiloff-Smith (1992) with respect to the emergence of inter-representational flexibility

in children’s drawing behaviour. We argued that the RR process includes part-whole

decomposition processes that are essential to the ability to produce cross-categorical

drawings (see also Spensley & Taylor, 1999; Vinter & Picard, 1996). If this is indeed the

case, then the prior activation of such processes through the use of a suitable task shouldenhance the production of cross-categorical innovations. Given this perspective, we used

two different decomposition tasks as a kind of ‘priming’ procedure, before asking

participants to perform cross-categorical innovations. Moreover, in line with our

hypothesis that common processes are involved, we expected to observe close relations

between the performances obtained in the decomposition and in the connection tasks.

We also hypothesized the existence of clear age-related changes in the way children

perform both the decomposition and the connection tasks. This latter point is discussed

Table 2.Distribution of the children as a function of their number of decomposed parts for drawing the

objects in two parts (TP) and in several parts (SP) decomposition tasks and their scores for connecting

the objects

Connecting scores

Number of decomposed parts 1 2 3

0 TP 1 1 1SP 1 5 2

2 TP 2 14 26SP – 1 5

3–4 SP – – 15–6 SP 2 1 77–8 SP 2 – 19–10 SP – – 3

Decomposing and connecting object representation 541

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first. An interpretation of the ‘priming’ effect follows, along with a discussion of what the

findings of this study imply for the RR model.

The results showed that a major developmental change in both decomposition and

connection abilities seems to occur at around age 7. Decomposing performances

increased strongly between 5 and 9 years of age, but were sensitive to both task and

object. From a quantitative point of view, the number of decomposed parts increasedfrom 7 years of age, especially when the children were requested to decompose their

graphic representations into several parts. Moreover, under SP decomposition

instruction, the man drawing allowed for greater decomposition in terms of its

constituent parts than the house drawing. From a more qualitative point of view, the

development of decomposition abilities was mainly related to the children’s increasing

tendency to perform ‘across-features’ decompositions, by vertically splitting the whole

object representation into two more or less symmetrical halves. This type of

performance was principally elicited by the TP decomposition requirements, and its

significant increase in frequency with age was observed for the house drawing. As wehave emphasized above, the across-features decompositions testify to high-level

planning abilities in children, because these abilities require the conscious management

of the overall organization of the objects’ features and continuous monitoring of the

depiction process (with a complete reorganization of the routine). This type of

decomposition necessarily involves analysing the part-whole relations of the

representations.

The development of connecting abilities also occurred at around age 7 and primarily

took the form of an increasing tendency to make ‘complex connections’ between the

two object representations, through combined processes of insertion, replacement,and/or modification of features of the representations. In our view, ‘complex

connections’ reflect high-level modifications for which a conscious focus on the overall

organization of the parts of the two objects is necessary. Again, a process of part-whole

analysis necessarily underpins this type of connection.

Age 7 has often been regarded as a key age at which major changes intervene in

graphic innovation abilities (see Berti & Freeman, 1997; Karmiloff-Smith, 1990, 1992,

1999; Picard & Vinter, 1999; Spensley & Taylor, 1999; Vinter & Picard, 1996), and

representational abilities in general (see Piaget & Inhelder, 1956). The present study

confirms this aspect, showing that age 7 was characterized by an increase in the ability tomanage part-whole relations in familiar object representations. In line with a well-known

observation, the young children were, by contrast, more inclined to work on the local

features of the representations of familiar objects. This was evident in the fact that the 5-

year-old children mostly produced between-features decompositions and established

simple connections between two familiar object representations. Between-features

decompositions consisted of segmenting the object based on its conceptual features and

could be managed through successively focusing on the local features of the

representations with no necessary consideration of the part-whole relations. Similarly,

the simple connections require a conscious focus on the local features of the objects.They may be qualified as one-way connections between object representations: one

object’s representation either gains some information from another one (insertion), or

exchanges some analogous information with another (replacement), without being

modified further. The present results are consistent with varied procedures used for

assessing children’s ability to perform representational changes in the drawing domain.

Specifically, we confirm the developmental shift from local to part-whole analyses of

familiar object representations between 5 and 7 years of age.

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The results support our main hypothesis of a possible ‘priming’ effect due to the

prior decomposition of object representations on children’s ability to subsequently

connect the objects. We did indeed observe an impact of the prior decomposition tasks

on children’s ability to perform connections between two object representations.

However, this impact was principally observed in the TP decomposition task, not in the

SP decomposition task. The children assigned to the TP decomposition task obtainedbetter connecting scores for the two objects than did the controls. These higher scores

were mainly attributable to an increasing production of complex connections by the

children. In line with our hypothesis, the very presence of a positive impact testifies to

the fact that the processes involved in the TP decomposition task were relevant for the

connection task. The TP decomposition task invited children to work on part-whole

decompositions (across-features decompositions), while such decompositions were

induced to only a lesser extent by the SP decomposition task. Sensitivity to drawing

instructions has already been well documented in the literature, and the present

instruction effect echoes results previously obtained under deletion conditions (seePicard & Vinter, 1999). In our view, the very activation of part-whole analysis processes

in the TP decomposition task further benefited the management of complex cross-

categorical connections, because this type of connection is rooted in such processes.

The close relations evidenced between decomposition and connection abilities also

supported our interpretation of the ‘priming’ effect. Specifically, we found that across-

features decompositions were closely associated with complex connections of objects.

These are both types of modifications that we had assumed to mobilize part-whole

analysis processes. By contrast, we found no specific association between the SP

decomposition abilities and children’s connecting performances, though, in the SPdecomposition task, the number of decomposed parts increased with age. The absence

of specific association between the number of decomposed parts and children’s

connecting performance suggests that the priming effect cannot be directly related to

the quantity of information children can extract from their graphic representations.

Rather, the positive impact of a prior decomposition task on subsequent connecting

performance can be linked to the very nature of the decomposition process elicited by

the task.

Positive as well as negative impacts of prior tasks on subsequent ones have already be

shown in different drawing contexts (see Bremner, Morse, Hughes, & Andreasen, 2000;Karmiloff-Smith, 1979). For instance, Bremner et al. showed that copying line diagrams

of cubes could benefit children’s performance in drawing cubes. Prior visual inspection

and/or prior naming of the model to be drawn have been shown to reinforce the

production of object-specific drawings in young children (see, for instance, Bremner &

Moore, 1984; Krascum, Tregenza, & Whitehead, 1996; Lewis, Russell, & Berridge, 1993).

In our study, the impact involved two drawing tasks that were both administered using

simple evocation of the objects to be drawn.

What do the findings of this study imply for the RR model? Our results are prima facie

in line with the RR account in that a transition from non-modifiable to increasingly moreflexible (E-level) representations was found to occur with age. The young children who

could not decompose their representations were also unable to display inter-

representational flexibility in their drawing behaviour. In line with the RR model, it can

be considered that these children have I-level representations. By contrast, the children

who could decompose their representations into their constituent parts were able to

produce cross-categorical drawings. It can be argued that these children have already

redescribed their representations. From this perspective, the RR process includes part-

Decomposing and connecting object representation 543

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whole decomposition processes that are, at least partially, responsible for the shift from

I-level to E-level representations.Furthermore, if flexible representations attest for E-level representations, there was a

change with age in the type as well as in the quantity of component parts on which

children can have a conscious access. However, only changes in the type of components

parts on which children can have a conscious access were shown to be related to

changes in connecting abilities. We believe that flexibility results from a progressive

redescription of the information present in the internal representations in terms of part-

whole relations. We suggest that part-whole processes first operate at a local level, so

that the children can have a conscious access on the components parts of their internal

representations (E1-level representations). The processes then extend to a more global

level, so that the children can have a conscious access on the whole and part-whole

relations of their internal representations (E2-level representations). Only this latter and

qualitative redescription of representations in terms of part-whole relations makes the

child’s internal representations sufficiently decomposable and flexible to allow for the

planning of complex connections between two different objects representations in

drawing.

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Received 1 June 2004; revised version received 6 March 2005

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