Cognition in Viewing and Talking about Art

Author(s): Judith Smith Koroscik

Source: Theory into Practice, Vol. 23, No. 4, Teaching the Arts (Autumn, 1984), pp. 330-334
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
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JudithSmith Koroscik
Cognition in Viewing
From the time the arts were introduced into the
schools, it was assumed their contributionto ed-
ucation was found in their ability to enhance af-
fective growth. The arts were considered to be
subjects where feelings and emotions reign su-
preme. Intellectualwork was reserved for subjects
like mathematics and science. Cognition and art
were seen as falling at distant ends of a curriculum
that contrasted intellectual activities with artistic
endeavors. This view was further reinforced when
Krathwohl,Bloom, and Masia (1964) divided their
taxonomies of educational objectives into separate
realms known as the cognitive, affective, and psy-
chomotor domains. Recent research, however, calls
this view into question.
Regardless of the field from which knowledge
originates or the form in which it is presented, its
acquisition cannot occur without the perception,
transformation,interpretation,retention, and appli-
cation of information(Reynolds & Flagg, 1983). The
delineation of these cognitive processes has be-
come the focus of much educational research in
recent years. Art educators have pursued the study
of cognition as it functions in the making of and
responding to works of art.
One facet of this research has dealt with the
effect of verbalization on the art-viewing process.
Relationships were investigated among structural,
semantic, and verbal statements made about works
of art. This research has come about because a
number of art teachers have shown increased in-
Judith Smith Koroscik is assistant professor of art edu-
cation at The Ohio State University.
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and Talking About Art
terest in enhancing the quality of students' under-
standing of art through activities involving critical
discourse about art. This article explores these
issues by highlightingfindings from several studies
(Koroscik,1982, 1983; Koroscik& Blinn, 1983; Ko-
roscik, Desmond, & Brandon, in press; Koroscik &
Osman, 1984; Koroscik & Wiley, 1984).
Levels of Processing Information
The study of cognition has produced theoretical
models of human informationprocessing. According
to one model that has received much attention, the
processing of informationis a continuumcomprised
of a number of successive levels or stages (Craik
& Lockhart, 1972). The first stage of processing
involves the analysis of sensory or structural fea-
tures of a stimulus (e.g., lines, angles, pitch, or
brightness); the second involves the application of
previously acquired knowledge in the interpretation
of meanings that characterize semantic dimensions
of stimuli (e.g., representational features, symbol-
ism, etc.).
Memories are formed as the byproducts of
processing. Their persistence is presumed to be "a
function of depth of analysis, with deeper levels of
analysis associated with more elaborate, longer
lasting, and stronger [memory] traces" (p. 675).
Informationprocessed from a single stimulus may
be encoded into memory in terms of its structural,
semantic, or phonemic (verbal)characteristics. The
durabilityof such stored informationcorresponds
to the depth to which it has been processed. This
in turn is affected by such variables as the amount
of time available for encoding, the nature of task
demands, the characteristics of the stimulus itself,
and the compatibilityof the stimulus with what the
viewer has already stored in memory.
Levels of Processing Art
Craikand Lockhart'slevels of processing model
provides a useful framework for research that fo-
cuses on the complexities associated with encoding
structural and semantic features of art. Each as-
sumes a different level of cognitive activity that
varies with the type of structural and semantic
information processed by viewers. These differ-
ences are worth noting in some detail.
Structural InformationProcessing
Structuralfeatures of art are those that phys-
ically reside in an art object, and as such they are
readily available for encoding to any viewer with
normal vision. Levels of processing structural in-
formationinclude(a) encoding an artwork'sphysical
properties (e.g., its size, surface qualities, and me-
dia),(b) discerningvisual elements that appear within
the work (e.g., colors, shapes, lines, and values),
and (c) observing relationshipsas they occur among
those elements. An example of such levels of struc-
tural processing as they correspond to Joseph
Turner's painting, Shade and Darkness: The Eve-
ning of the Deluge, are represented in the following
statements:
1. The artist applied oils to canvas when he pro-
duced this artwork which measures approxi-
mately 30 x 30 inches.
2. A large curving mass of browns and blacks
borders the upper edge of this artwork.
3. Values of brown arch over a large white mass
in the upper half of this circularcomposition.
Semantic InformationProcessing
In contrast, the processing of meaning de-
mands that visual information present in an art
object be interpretedas "standing for" what is not
immediately present (Bartlett, 1932). The interpre-
tation of meaning can include (a) identifying rep-
resentational features and expressive qualities, (b)
recognizing instances of symbolic denotation, and
(c) determining underlying religious, social, eco-
nomic, philosophical, or political principles exem-
plified by a work. These processing characteristics
are illustrated in the following statements about
Turner's painting:
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1. This turbulent composition includes the repre-
sentation of storm clouds, rain, a body of water,
a sailing vessel, and numerous animals.
2. The scene depicted in this artworkcorresponds
to the Biblical account of Noah's Ark and the
Great Flood.
3. This artwork reflects a spiritualisticconcern for
mankind'suniversalapostasy and corruptionand
their devastating consequences.
The difficulties often associated with deriving
meaning from art are evidenced in the frustration
experienced by many viewers who, without the aid
of contextual informationor priorknowledge of art,
gaze upon the structuralfeatures of highlyabstract
works only to ask: "What is it?" or "What does it
mean?" Althoughpainted in 1843, the subject mat-
ter represented in the Turner painting described
above is characteristicallyhigh in abstraction. Cas-
ual viewers often mistake it for a more contem-
porary painting and are seldom successful in
detecting its representation of animals let alone its
spiritual overtones. When subsequently informed
that the work depicts Noah's Arkin the Great Flood,
representational features and expressive qualities
are readily discerned. This points up an important
research problem, i.e., how does verbal information
affect the formation of structuraland semantic en-
codings of art?
Verbalization Effects on Processing Art
Theoretical debates persist when explanations
are offered on how verbalizationaffects the proc-
essing of pictorial stimuli. Two models, the dual-
encoding model and the sensory-semantic model,
have been most useful in predictingthe role verbal
mediation plays in structural and semantic proc-
essing. According to the dual-encoding model (Pai-
vio, 1971, 1978), the verbalization of a picture's
features increases the probabilitythat two codes
are activated in the formationof stimulus memories.
The argument is that sensory features of pictures
are stored in imagery codes, while the products of
verbalization are retained as verbal or linguistic
codes. The redundancyof stored informationin dual
codes increases the likelihoodthat a picture will be
remembered. Simply stated, two codes are better
than one.
The effect of verbalizationon the encoding of
pictorial stimuli is characterized somewhat differ-
ently by the sensory-semantic model (Nelson, Reed,
& McEvoy, 1977). In this view, pictures and their
verbaldescriptions are assumed to evoke distinctive
VolumeXXIII,Number4 331
sensory representations in memory but access a
common semantic system. Presumably,the analysis
of a picture's semantic features is requisite to the
formation of verbal descriptions or the derivation
of meaning from those contextually presented. Ver-
balizing about stimulus features ensures that se-
mantic processing of the picture occurs, which
thereby increases the likelihood that semantic in-
formationis maintainedas memories of the stimulus
(Warren & Horn, 1982). These assumptions are
consistent with Craik and Lockhart's (1972) argu-
ment that deeper or more semantic levels of proc-
essing result in the generation of more elaborate
and longer lasting memory traces.
Onlyrecently has empiricalevidence been gath-
ered to determine whether these predictions ac-
curately characterize the cognitive processes
associated with viewing art. In one study (Koroscik,
1982), verbal task demands directed viewing re-
sponses to the six levels of structuraland semantic
processing noted earlier. It was hypothesized that
the encoding and retention of visual art would be
significantlylower under task directives to verbalize
structuralfeatures than under task instructions re-
questing the verbalization of semantic
characteristics.
Results verified this general hypothesis; how-
ever, they also indicatedsome structuralprocessing
tasks produced retention rates that were unex-
pectedly matched by those generated in response
to semantic task demands. It was speculated that
such findings may have resulted as a function of
testing procedures that allowed structural infor-
mation to be processed semantically in the ver-
balizationof those structuralfeatures. Exclusive use
of verbal processing tasks and verbal questions on
the retention measure precludedfurtherspeculation
of verbalization effects from these findings.
Subsequent investigations (Koroscik & Blinn,
1983; Koroscik&Osman, 1984) examined structural
and semantic informationprocessing by direct com-
parison of viewing and testing responses that de-
manded or did not demand verbalization.Processing
tasks used in this research and in a later experiment
(Koroscik & Wiley, 1984) directed viewers to focus
on a specified area of an artwork or to examine a
work in its entirety on either verbal or nonverbal
terms. Assessment of encoding and retention spec-
ificity could thus be obtained by analyzing differ-
ences in retention scores for information from
incidental and intentional areas of artworks in the
restricted viewing conditions.
332 Theory Into Practice
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Results of the experiments indicatedthe nature
of processing task demands affected the amount
of informationsubjects retained after viewing art-
works of varyinglevels of abstraction. Verbaltasks
instructing students to consider an artwork in its
entirety by generating a title that characterized the
work resulted in greater retention of structuraland
semantic features than all other verbal and non-
verbalprocessing tasks. Such findingssupportthose
of an earlier investigation (Koroscik, 1982) and fol-
low theoretical predictions that naming pictures en-
sures semantic processing and thus promotes
greater retention of stimulus information(Craik &
Lockhart, 1972; Nelson et al., 1977).
Interestingly, the findings also suggested the
occurrence of implicit verbalization or some form
of semantic processing under task conditions that
did not demand semantic analysis for verbal re-
sponses to stimuli. This was indicated by low re-
tention scores for structuralinformationthat resulted
when students viewed highly abstract works of art.
Structural encodings were apparently difficult to
retain when high levels of abstraction inhibitedtheir
association with representationalfeatures. The rel-
ative ease in translating subject matter of less ab-
stract works promotedgreater retention,presumably
by the concurrentprocessing of meaning and struc-
tural attributes.
This explanation follows an assumption of the
sensory-semantic model of encoding that visual,
meaning, and phonemic features of pictorialstimuli
need not be fully integrated into complete memory
representations before the processing of succeed-
ing features is initiated. "Instead, encoding is pre-
sumed to be a dynamic, continuous process
occurring through time. At any one point in time
different types of features may be in the state of
being processed simultaneously" (Nelson et al.,
1977, p. 487). This and other evidence lends sup-
port to the conclusion that verbal processing was
largely responsible for improved retention of both
structural and semantic features of art.
A later study (Koroscik, Desmond, & Brandon,
in press) further examined the relationship among
structural, semantic, and verbal encodings of art
by displaying works of varied levels of abstraction
with verbal contextual information. It was specu-
lated that the encoding and retention of art is sub-
ject to the type of contextual informationgiven to
viewers at presentation. Verbal labels with literal
references to the objects, persons, or events de-
picted in an artwork ought to evoke semantic en-
codings that differfromthose generated in response
to verbal references pertaining to the work's ex-
pressive qualities and/or other nonliteralaspects of
the depicted content. Accordingly,it was presumed
that persons with prior knowledge of art carry par-
allel informationto art viewing experiences in the
form of previously stored cognitions. Contextual
informationmay function merely as redundant in-
formation for such viewers, or it may provide re-
trieval cues that access pertinent memories. A test
of these assumptions was conducted by manipu-
lating verbal context conditions for groups of art
and non-art college students.
Results of the study were consistent with pre-
vious findings. They indicated that the retention of
structural informationwas linked to the retention
of its meanings. The presentation of verbalcontexts
ensured that meaning was processed to some ex-
tent, thus facilitating the retention of semantic in-
formation which in turn promoted the retention of
structural features. Results also indicated that ac-
curate interpretationof meaning was a function of
the level of abstraction that characterized each
artwork and of the type of contextual information
given at input. Even more sophisticated viewers
with priorknowledge of art benefited from the pres-
entation of verbal contextual information.
Educational Implications
These findings offer direction for curriculum
development through the identificationof variables
that affect the acquisition of knowledge in art view-
ing contexts. Questions derived from such research
ask practitioners to consider the following when
designing art learningexperiences for their students:
1. What is the nature of artworks selected for
presentation to students?
2. What level of abstraction characterizes the
works to be shown?
3. How much time will students be given to ex-
amine each work of art?
4. Are the artworks to be presented similar or
much different in structure and meaning from
those previously examined by students?
5. What requisite knowledge of art and of the
world is assumed in the study of particular
works?
6. What is the nature of tasks students are to
perform when viewing the artworks presented
to them?
7. Willtasks direct students to an artwork'sstruc-
tural features or meanings?
8. Will tasks demand verbal or nonverbal re-
sponses from students?
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9. If meanings are to be processed from highly
abstract art, will verbal or visual contextual
information be provided to facilitate their
interpretation?
10. What willensure that students comprehendthe
correspondence between contextual informa-
tion and the structural and semantic features
of art?
The research reported in this article provides
only a small sample of existing evidence that chal-
lenges a noncognitive view of art. A more tenable
view is one which assumes that all realms where
learningoccurs, includinglearningin the arts, have
their cognitive, affective, and psychomotor aspects.
To assume that the objectives pursued in the ac-
quisition of a given subject are all of one type is
to misconstrue the insights beginningto emerge in
the psychology of cognition.
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334 Theory Into Practice

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