There are times when your child proudly presents you with their

scribble of a stick figure with crazy hair. It might worth a closer look: if 【M1】__________

their drawing includes certain features, you could have a genius in your 【M2】__________

hands.

According to a new study of human figures drawn by children aged

seven to nine, there are 30 so-called “exceptional items” that only highly

gifted children draw when depict people. 【M3】__________

Previous attempts to analyze children’s intelligence through their

drawings have focused on their “drawing IQs”: the number of features

and items drawn by a child judged against an average number drawn by 【M4】__________

children in their age group. This approach, however, is controversial.

Not only does drawing IQs give no information about the particular 【M5】__________

features drawn, but there are doubts about how valid the scores are as a

predictor of intelligence. There is currently no precise score that

differentiates gifted from not-gifted children. What is considered to be

gifted goes over a high IQ. For example, the role of creativity—in the 【M6】__________

form of generating novel ideas, thinking flexibly and out-of-the-box—is

widely considered a sign of giftedness. But these children give unusually 【M7】__________

answers to intelligence tests. Their answers are not necessarily wrong

but cannot be considered correct, because that they are not mentioned in 【M8】__________

the scoring manuals of the used tests.

A research team found that out of 135 items drawn by the 120

children in their study, 30 items were considered to be “exceptional” and

a possible indicator for gifted. In the drawings of the highly gifted 【M9】__________

group, each of the 30 exceptional items occurred only once or twice.

Also, 20 of the highly gifted children drew one or more exceptional

items. Highly gifted children produce many novel drawings when 【M10】_________

compared with non-gifted children.

【M9】