Although I appreciate any attempt at arts advocacy, I do not typically pay much heed when people start touting the ancillary benefits of arts education. I am a firm believer that there is a core, intrinsic value to a robust arts education. Some of this value is obvious, if under-appreciated. Arts education directly strengthens, among other skills, creativity, collaboration, time management, resilience, focus, and global and cultural awareness.
That said, there is a compelling argument for the arts’ role in overall cognitive development. Thalia R. Goldstein of George Mason University, Matthew D. Lerner of Stony Brook University, and Ellen Winner of Boston College published a piece in a 2017 issue of Child Development titled “The Arts as a Venue for Developmental Science: Realizing a Latent Opportunity.” Goldstein and her colleagues pinpoint cognitive skills developed by each specific discipline.
Visual art: recognizing (generating mental images).
Theater: trusting self-impulses, paying attention to others.
Music: social affiliation.
Another skill set built through art creation, particularly theater and music, is “theory of mind concepts—thinking about the intentions, motivations, feelings, and beliefs of characters, as well as trusting self-impulses and physicality of their body.” Those familiar with the purpose and work of this blog are well aware of the importance of these “soft skills” and how necessary and undervalued they are in modern society. Arts education is one of the few bastions in the western socio-educational complex that fosters and reinforces these skills.
Among the most remarkable traits exercised by artistic training, particularly in visual arts, is dual representation. Dual representation is a concept introduced by Judy DeLoache in a 2000 issue of the same journal. DeLoache identifies two components of dual representation. The first is the symbol itself, or an “entity that someone intends to stand for something other than itself.” The second is representational insight, which she defines as the ability to “detect and mentally represent, at some level, the relation between the symbol and what it stands for, its referent.” John Medina, in his brilliant 2008 book Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, astutely divines how this concept, which he describes as an evolutionary phenomenon, corresponds with the unique ability of humans to create and interpret art. He writes:
Thank you for reading.
DeLoache, J.S. (2000). Dual Representation and Young Childrens Use of Scale Models. Child Development, 71(2), 329–338.
Goldstein, T. R., Lerner, M. D., & Winner, E. (2017). The Arts as a Venue for Developmental Science: Realizing a Latent Opportunity. Child Development, 88(5), 1505–1512.
That said, there is a compelling argument for the arts’ role in overall cognitive development. Thalia R. Goldstein of George Mason University, Matthew D. Lerner of Stony Brook University, and Ellen Winner of Boston College published a piece in a 2017 issue of Child Development titled “The Arts as a Venue for Developmental Science: Realizing a Latent Opportunity.” Goldstein and her colleagues pinpoint cognitive skills developed by each specific discipline.
Visual art: recognizing (generating mental images).
Theater: trusting self-impulses, paying attention to others.
Music: social affiliation.
Another skill set built through art creation, particularly theater and music, is “theory of mind concepts—thinking about the intentions, motivations, feelings, and beliefs of characters, as well as trusting self-impulses and physicality of their body.” Those familiar with the purpose and work of this blog are well aware of the importance of these “soft skills” and how necessary and undervalued they are in modern society. Arts education is one of the few bastions in the western socio-educational complex that fosters and reinforces these skills.
Among the most remarkable traits exercised by artistic training, particularly in visual arts, is dual representation. Dual representation is a concept introduced by Judy DeLoache in a 2000 issue of the same journal. DeLoache identifies two components of dual representation. The first is the symbol itself, or an “entity that someone intends to stand for something other than itself.” The second is representational insight, which she defines as the ability to “detect and mentally represent, at some level, the relation between the symbol and what it stands for, its referent.” John Medina, in his brilliant 2008 book Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, astutely divines how this concept, which he describes as an evolutionary phenomenon, corresponds with the unique ability of humans to create and interpret art. He writes:
We are so good at dual representation, we combine symbols to derive layers of meaning. It gives us the capacity for language, and for writing down that language. It gives us the capacity to reason mathematically. It gives us the capacity for art. Combinations of circles and squares become geometry and Cubist paintings. Combinations of dots and squiggles become music and poetry. There is an unbroken intellectual line between symbolic reasoning and the ability to create culture. And no other creature is capable of doing it.For more about the distinctly human connection with art, one of my recent posts, “Art, Consciousness, & Karma,” explores this concept through the lens of Carl Jung’s “collective unconscious,” Marcel Proust’s moments bienheureux, and Rupert Spira and Rainey Bennett's analysis of the similarities and distinctions of artist and scientist.
Thank you for reading.
References
Medina, J. (2008). Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School. Seattle, WA: Pear Press.DeLoache, J.S. (2000). Dual Representation and Young Childrens Use of Scale Models. Child Development, 71(2), 329–338.
Goldstein, T. R., Lerner, M. D., & Winner, E. (2017). The Arts as a Venue for Developmental Science: Realizing a Latent Opportunity. Child Development, 88(5), 1505–1512.
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