Representations of Families through the Children’s Drawings in Parental Divorce Incidents in Greece

Abstract

The purpose of the present research is the study of children’s perceptions through their drawings about their divorced families. Specifically the study is focused on the roles and functions in the family and the dynamics between the family members. Concerning the sample, it is consisted of 26 children’s drawings. The participants are aged between 5 and 12 years old (M=8.23, SD=2.42) and all of them are living with the mother. It is important to say that the present research was conducted when the parents were already divorced for six months or less. The psychometric tools which were given to each child were two kinds of drawings: (1) Corman’s static family drawing and (2) Burns & Kaufman’s kinetic family drawing. As for the results of the present study, it is shown that the 38.5% of the participants chose to draw their real family in the static family drawing, including though both parents, another 38.5% drew an imaginary family and the 23% drew an ideal family (relatives or friends). Concerning the kinetic family drawings, the 69.2% of the participants drew both parents. However the 30.8% is shown to interact with none of the parents or other familial members and also the self-figure is drawn isolated, without being a part of any subsystem, in the majority (61.5%) of the kinetic family drawings. Concluding, based on the fact that the drawings consist a projective assessment technique, they are able to show the children’s thoughts, emotions or desires. As a result, we can assume that the children do not seem to accept the recent parental separation, as the majority of the participants drew both parents. Nevertheless, there is a noteworthy percentage of drawings, where the participants’ self-figure interacts with no other person or tends to be totally isolated.

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