Learning to See by Learning to Draw: A Longitudinal Analysis of the Relationship Between Representational Drawing Training and Visuospatial Skill

A growing body of correlational research has revealed systematic relationships between various aspects of visuospatial processing and representational drawing ability. However, very few studies have sought to examine the longitudinal development of the relation between drawing and visuospatial ability. The current investigation explored change in drawing and visuospatial skill in art students taking a foundational drawing course (n = 42) in a longitudinal design. Measures of representational drawing skill, dispositional traits, and visuospatial skill were taken at three time points over the course of five months. The findings reveal improvements in representational drawing, mental rotation, disembedding figures, and attentional switching. However, individual differences in change over time on one task did not predict change in another, revealing implications for domain-specific and domain-general aspects of art and design expertise