Drawing for others: influence of referential intention in early production of drawings / Dibujar para otros: influencia de la intencionalidad referencial en la producción temprana de dibujos

This study examines if and how the presence of an adult as a receptive agent of children’s drawings has an effect on the early production of pictorial symbols by emphasizing the children’s referential intention as drawers. To this end, we compared 3-year-old children’s representational drawings with a model in four experimental conditions, three conditions with an adult as a receptive agent and one condition without a receiver. In the conditions with a receiver (Linguistic Feedback, Graphic Demonstration, and Graphic Product) children were explicitly asked to draw for an adult, who had to use the children’s pictures to find hidden objects in identical boxes; the conditions differed in the adult’s actions with non-representational drawings. The results indicate that the presence of the receiver had an impact on representational production only when the adult demonstrated how to create the drawings with the intent of communicating the identity of the objects (Graphic Demonstration). Although drawing is typically viewed as a solitary activity, these results suggest that representational drawings may emerge in communicative contexts between drawers and receivers.