Children\'s and Adolescents\' Conceptions in Describing, Preferring, and Judging Works of Art

G2 analysis was used to test the independency among grade, preference, and judgment. Kappa analysis was used to understand the agreement among five judges. The findings indicate that most students tend to identify subject matters when describing realistic and expressive works of art, and tend to identify visual elements when describing abstract work of art.

The description of expressiveness of a picture increase along with grade levels. For the students under universiity level, expressive and abstract works of works of art are more provocative. Their responses to these works of art are more rich.

When students state their preferences about realistic and expressive works, first and third graders focus on the subject matter, and fifth, seventh, and ninth graders count on expression. When students state their preferences about abstract work, first and third graders think beauty/reality is important, and fifth and seventh graders consider cognition, ninth graderss emphasize on expression and beauty/reality. The students after ninth grade depend on the expression of a picture no matter the types of art works.

The statements students made for their preference were significant with grade. For judging a work of art, first graders rely on subject matter in a realistic work, and visual elements in expressive and abstract works. Third graders think of both subject matter and beauty/reallity in a realistic work, and only beauty/reality in expressive and abstract work.

Fifth grader recognize the beauty/reality in a realistic work, expressiveness in an expressive work, and cognition in an abstract work. Most seventh graders and university students concern with expressiveness in realistic and expressive works, and form design in an abstract work. the expressiveness is important at both ninth and eleventh graders no matter the types of works. When facing expressive or abstract works, more students point out the understanding of the work.

The statements students made for their judgements were significant with grade. Except reasoning, there are disparities of students\' voting between preferences and judgements. The differences between the preferences a judgments students\' made were sognificant with grade in three types of works, but not with profession.

Even students in first grade differentiate the reasons for their personal preferences and evaluation a work of art. The differentiation might dismiss when students have art expertise. There is no significant difference between the preferences and judgments made by university students with art major.

The concepts of students\' reasoning for their preference and judgement have concrete structures that rarely influences by types of works. As a result, students of each grade level present different aesthetic skills and concepts in describing, preferring, and judging a work of art. questions used to solicit the responses influences the types of comments the subject made. The specific changes of responding may emerge when questionss are posed differently.