Invented Worlds: The Psychology of the Arts

by Ellen Winner

Cave paintings of our prehistoric ancestors, elaborate ritual dances of preliterate tribesmen, long lines at the movies, earnest scribbles of the three-year-old next door―evidence of human preoccupation with art is everywhere, and it is overwhelming. But unlike other human universals―language, tool use, the family―art makes no material contribution to mankind’s survival. What impels the artist to the lonely effort at self-expression? What moves the audience to resonate to the work of a master? What accounts for the child’s inherent fascination with pictures and stories and songs?

These questions are among the deepest we can ask about human nature. Freud deemed some of them forever unanswerable, but modern psychology has made new inroads into these old mysteries. Invented Worlds provides a complete, authoritative account of this progress. Dealing with the three major art forms―painting, music, and literature―Ellen Winner shows how the artist fashions a symbolic world that transforms the experience of the observer. She probes the adult’s ability to create and respond to works of art. In addition, she examines children’s art for what it can reveal about the artistic impulse before adult convention becomes a shaping force. Finally, in order to reach a better understanding of the biological bases of artistry, Winner discusses the art of the mentally disturbed and the neurologically impaired patient.

The sum of these discussions is more than an up-to-date handbook to the field; it is nothing less than a new synthesis of our understanding of man’s artistic nature. Written with admirable clarity, Invented Worlds is a book that can be used by professionals and students in psychology, education, and the arts, as well as anyone with reason to be curious about the processes that underlie the creation and enjoyment of art.

Genres: Psychology, Art

448 pages, Paperback

First published December 12, 1982

About the author

Ellen Winner is a psychologist and a professor at Boston College. She specializes in psychology of art.

Winner graduated from the Putney School in 1965 and received a PhD in developmental psychology from Harvard University in 1978. She collaborated on Project Zero to conduct studies about the way people experience and perceive art. Winner noted how psychological explorations beginning in the realm of philosophy pertained to art.

From 1995 to 96, Winner served as president of the American Psychological Association Division 10. In 2000, Winner was awarded the Rudolf Arnheim Award for Outstanding Achievement in Psychology and the Arts.

Reviews

[Lee Coleman · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the mid-eighties I took 'Psychology of the Arts' with Professor Winner and her book was the reference book used for the class. Forty years later, I am attempting to sift through the ridiculous number of college books I've held on to, many I never really gave a good read, before pitching them into the book bin at my local library. It's funny thinking back on how I hated 'having to' read a book for a class in order to write a paper on it, only to find myself decades later 'choosing to' read the same book and happily writing about the book in a review.
My first thought is that this book doesn't actually dive into the psychology of the arts. Rather, it is an investigation into the neurobiology of 1. creativity and 2. the perception of art. The author consolidates an impressive number of research studies on cognitive development of skills related to drawing (skills like composition, style, perspective), writing (skills like metaphors, poetry, story structure), and music (skills like pitch, tonality, and composition). Winner deftly presents how these skills develop cognitively from infancy to adulthood with many visual illustrations to highlight the various topics she is covering. She includes research that looked at the impact of left hemispheric strokes versus right hemispheric strokes on artistic ability as well as studies on how artistry may be impacted by schizophrenia. Intertwined with the discussions on creating art were discourses on the development of skills related to perception of art, and how those skills develop cognitively over time.
While her chapters that focused on drawing were very engaging, her chapters on writing were much less involved, and her chapters regarding music were even weaker, as it is impossible to include auditory examples to highlight the points she was trying to cover. She includes research on artists who had strokes and schizophrenia, but not any other brain injuries like frontal injury, brain tumors, or seizure disorders, not any other mental illnesses, and none that explored environmental influences like cultural differences that may impact art creation and perception.
That said, the book was surprisingly readable. It was fluidly written and well-illustrated. I'm sure most of the book is rather outdated and focuses on neurotypical development -which may bother readers hoping to see the inclusion of neurodivergent artists in the book. But I was happy to give it a more attentive second read.