OF THE INTELLIGENCE OF YOUNG CHILDREN 17 



3. Interpretation. The meaning of the picture or the 

 nature of the people is told either by a brief word or by an 

 explanatory remark, and often there is even an emotional 

 note, of sadness or of sympathy; it is possible that this emo- 

 tional note exists with children who make a more simple re- 

 sponse, but they are unable to express it. We call these re- 

 sponses interpretations, because they go beyond the visual 

 impression; there is a real effort to explain the situation de- 

 picted. Examples : 



Prmt 1 : A rag picker. — A poor man moving. — There are 

 some people moving without paying the rent. — There is a man 

 in trouble. ' 



Print 2: They are in want. — A miserable creature. — They 

 are poor creatures sitting on a bench, and they have no home to 

 sleep in. — It is night, they are poor and needy. 



Print 3 : A prisoner. — That represents a prisoner, a man 

 who is in prison, zvho climbs on his pallet to look through the 

 prison window which is barred. 



If the words moving, miserable and prisoner are used 

 in the descriptions, it is safe to conclude that the pictures 

 have been interpreted. The hierarchy which we have intro- 

 duced in classifying our responses can not be defended phil- 

 osophically. An observer, hostile to all theory, would claim 

 that descriptions are superior to interpretations because they 

 are less subject to error; they state exact facts, adding noth- 

 ing, while interpretation is conjecture, and may be purely 

 fanciful. "Hypotheses non fingo," such a critic will say. 

 Such discussions will arise. The point which we have made 

 as a result of our studies with children, certainly merits use 

 as an argument in the debate. As only the older children use 

 interpretation we conclude that a higher intellectual level is 

 necessary for its production. But the question is a compli- 

 cated one ; it is necessary not only to take into account the in- 

 tellectual level, but also the possible deviations and errors 

 peculiar to the same level. We recall having shown our pic- 



