Tadpole person
{{Short description|Simplistic humanoid figure}}
File:Child Art Aged 4.5 Person 2.png
A tadpole person{{cite journal |last1=Freeman |first1=N.H. |date=3 April 1975 |title=Do children draw men with arms coming out of the head? |url=https://www.nature.com/articles/254416a0 |journal=Nature |volume=254 |issue=5499 |pages=416–417 |doi=10.1038/254416a0 |bibcode=1975Natur.254..416F |s2cid=4269922 |access-date=2023-11-15}}{{cite book |last=Bassett |first=Elizabeth M. |date=1977 |editor-last=Butterworth |editor-first=George |title=The Child's Representation of the World |publisher=Plenum Press |pages=49–59 |chapter=Chapter 3: Production Strategies in the Child's Drawing of the Human Figure: Towards an Argument for a Model of Syncretic Perception |isbn= 0306310252}}{{cite journal |last1=Spensley |first1=Fiona |last2=Taylor |first2=Josie |date=1999 |title=The Development of Cognitive Flexibility: Evidence from Children's Drawings |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26763422 |journal=Human Development |volume=42 |issue=6 |pages=300–324 |doi=10.1159/000022639 |jstor=26763422 |s2cid=29015414 |access-date=2023-11-15}} or headfooter{{cite journal |last1=ter Laak |first1=J. |last2=de Goede |first2=M. |last3=Aleva |first3=A. |last4=van Rijswijk |first4=P. |date=2005 |title=The Draw-A-Person Test: An Indicator of Children's Cognitive and Socioemotional Adaptation? |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.3200/GNTP.166.1.77-93 |journal=The Journal of Genetic Psychology |volume=166 |issue=1 |pages=77–93 |doi=10.3200/GNTP.166.1.77-93 |pmid=15782679 |hdl=1874/27790 |s2cid=12572911 |access-date=2023-11-15|hdl-access=free }}{{cite conference |url=https://www.hospitalteachers.eu/hopeinmunich/vortraege/en_Seidel.C_Interpreting_Childrens_Drawings.pdf |title=Model for Interpreting Drawings and its Application in the Hospital School |last1=Seidel |first1=Christa |date=November 3–7, 2010 |location=Munich |conference=7th Hope Congress}} is a simplistic representation of a human being as a figure without a torso, with arms and legs attached to the head. Tadpole people appear in young children's drawings before they learn to draw torsos and move on to more realistic depictions such as stick figures.
Preschoolers who draw tadpole people will generally not draw torsos, even when instructed to include features that are part of the torso, such as a belly button. Instead, they tend to draw the feature onto the tadpole person without modifying the figure.{{cite journal |last1=Coté |first1=Carol A. |last2=Golbeck |first2=Susan |date=2007-08-13 |title=Pre-schoolers' feature placement on own and others' person drawings |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09669760701516868 |journal=International Journal of Early Years Education |volume=15 |issue=3 |pages=231–243 |doi=10.1080/09669760701516868 |s2cid=143866588 |access-date=2023-03-20}}{{cite journal |last1=Boyatzis |first1=C.J. |last2=Michaelson |first2=P. |last3=Lyle |first3=E. |date=1995 |title=Symbolic immunity and flexibility in preschoolers' human figure drawings |url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7595423/ |journal=The Journal of Genetic Psychology |volume=156 |issue=3 |pages=293–302 |doi=10.1080/00221325.1995.9914824 |pmid=7595423 |access-date=2023-03-20}}
Clinical significance
In cognitive tests such as the Draw-a-Person test, the drawing of tadpole people by adults may indicate a cognitive impairment. For example, patients with dementia tend to draw tadpole people when tasked to draw human figures.{{cite journal |last1=Ericsson |first1=Kjerstin |last2=Hillerås |first2=Pernilla |last3=Holmen |first3=Karin |last4=Winblad |first4=Bengt |date=1996 |title=Human-figure drawing (HFD) in the screening of cognitive impairment in old age |journal=Journal of Medical Screening |volume=3 |issue=2 |pages=105–109 |doi=10.1177/096914139600300212 |pmid=8849770 |doi-access=free }}
Cultural influence
In June 2015, a study examined the tadpole self-drawings of 183 children. It found that the basic vertical structure of a tadpole person isn't affected by a child's cultural background, though certain features still varied depending on their ecosocial context. Children from educated and urban circumstances drew themselves with a wider range of facial expressions and a taller height, whereas children from rural and traditional contexts drew themselves with fewer facial expressions and a shorter height.{{Cite journal |last1=Gernhardt |first1=Ariane |last2=Rübeling |first2=Hartmut |last3=Keller |first3=Heidi |date=2015-06-17 |title=Cultural perspectives on children's tadpole drawings: at the interface between representation and production |journal=Frontiers in Psychology |language=English |volume=6 |page=812 |doi=10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00812 |issn=1664-1078 |doi-access=free|pmid=26136707 |pmc=4469825 }}
In art
File:Hieronymus bosch last judgement grylloi.jpg The Last Judgment by Hieronymus Bosch, showing a gryllos that bears resemblance to a headfooter.]]
The early work of Austrian artist Oswald Tschirtner often contained headfooters.{{cite magazine |last= |first= |date=1989 |title=Oswald Tschirtner |url= |magazine=Raw Vision |location= |publisher= |access-date= |page=32 |issue=2}}{{cite book |last=Maizels |first=John |date=2000-09-20 |title=Raw Creation: Outsider Art and Beyond |url= |location= |publisher=Phaidon Press |page=90 |isbn=978-0714840093}}
The Last Judgment by Hieronymus Bosch features a gryllos that shares features with headfooters.
Fictional characters such as Roger Hargreaves's Mr. Men or the video game character Kirby have this type of design, which may appeal to young children who draw people in this way.{{citation needed|date=March 2024}}