Children’s Pictures and Mirror Theory

When a child expresses himself or herself with his or her pictures, he or she follows an impulse that emerges with the effect of his or her mental and physical development. This process, which occurs by nature, is a dynamic phenomenon that is constantly changing and developing. As a result of painting activities, the child presents a mirror that reflects his or her inner world and contains developmental clues to adults. These features of children’s painting can be counted among the most important discoveries of psychology that emerged at the end of the 19th century. Therefore, the mirror theory, which reflects the inner world of the child, lies on the basis of the interest in children’s drawings, which has been increasing in the last two centuries. Especially in the period between 1885 and 1920, there were efforts to collect, describe, and classify children's paintings in many different countries. During this period, research was carried out on many children’s pictures, and the pictures were classified according to the gender, sociocultural structure, and age of the children, taking into account some characteristics. It will be seen that these simple classifications made at the beginning will diversify according to the cognitive, affective, and psychomotor development characteristics of the child with the help of psychology in the following years. In this study, we aimed to provide information about the mirror theory and to present a compilation of the views of scientists who researched this theory.