THE FIGURE DRAWINGS OF JEWISH REFORM AND ORTHODOX MALE ADOLESCENTS

Abstract

The purpose of this investigation was to compare the Human Figure Drawings of Jewish Orthodox and Reform male 13 and 14 year olds. It was hypothesized that there would be significant differences in the Human Figure Drawings of these two subject groups, due to the differences in their educational and cultural milieus.;The drawings made by the two groups of subjects were scored according to a rating scale developed by Palumbo (1981). A portion of the samples was scored by two individual raters so that inter-scorer reliability could be established. Inter-group differences were calculated both for individual drawing characteristics and for eight general traits derived by grouping the specific drawing characteristics.;A comparison of the drawings of the Orthodox and Reform groups revealed significant differences in 14% of the specific drawing characteristics, in the direction of greater incidence for the Orthodox. Significant differences in five of the eight general traits were also discovered, again in the direction of greater incidence for the Orthodox subject group. A discriminant analysis was performed and it was shown that an individual's score profile on the Human Figure Drawing was highly predictive of Orthodox or Reform group membership.;In conclusion, it appears that differences do exist in the use of Human Figure Drawing characteristics between the Orthodox and Reform subject groups. This suggests that adolescents in different cultural milieus are subject to different kinds of experiences which are reflected in their Human Figure Drawings.