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CORVALLIS, Ore. - A comparative analysis of artwork from more than 500 young children in Oregon and Israel found that youths in both countries increasingly are drawn to leisure activities that are solitary - such as computer games and television - instead of group activities.

And that has educators concerned about long-term impacts on socialization and collaboration, according to Nell O'Malley, a faculty member in the College of Education at Oregon State University.

"Children today spend more time at their computers or television and less time in structured groups like scouts," O'Malley said. "They spend less time developing social skills and getting along - things that we all need later in life, in the workplace and elsewhere."

O'Malley and co-investigator Rachel Kroupp, of Kaye Academic College of Education in Israel, have been invited to present their findings next month at an international conference on arts education in Viseu, Portugal.

The study began as a comparative look at leisure preferences of children grades 1-5 in Corvallis, Ore., and Beer-Sheva, Israel, using artwork as a primary means of communication. The children were asked to draw their favorite leisure activities, not those that were most common. They also were asked to describe their interest in those activities as serious or casual.

Sports were frequently represented by both student groups and found to be the most popular leisure activity among 41 percent of Corvallis youths and 37 percent of Beer-Sheva children. But of those Corvallis children who preferred social activities outside of sports (about 22.5 percent), one out of four liked playing with their pets, and one out five liked playing alone or watching television.

Thirty percent of the Israeli children say they preferred social activities to sports and nearly half of them listed television as their favorite pastime.

"That is a lot of isolation," said OSU's O'Malley, a former teacher who specializes in working with talented and gifted children and who now chairs the Corvallis School Board. "Certainly, there is more collaborative work today in classrooms than in the past but those group activities are by direction, not choice. Likewise, sports can be very collaborative, but they are largely directed.

"We may need to provide more opportunities for children to organize and express themselves on their own," she added.

O'Malley said that in some ways, children had more freedom 40 or 50 years ago than they do today, while in other ways they were more restricted. A half-century ago, she said, children freely roamed their neighborhoods on foot or on bicycles, and played for hours - usually in self-directed ways.

Technology, traffic congestion, an increase in the number of families with both parents working, and what O'Malley calls "a fear-based age" have changed the way children behave today, she said.

"A lot of parents wouldn't dream of letting their 7-year-old daughter ride a bike across town today," O'Malley pointed out, "whereas when I was that age, that's all we did. Crime may not be greater today, but that culture of fear certainly is. We've replaced children's freedom with a great deal of isolation that ultimately may not be that healthy."

O'Malley cites scouting as one activity that is partially directly and closely supervised, yet encourages collaboration and allows for freedom.

"Parents should look for other ways to get children involved," she said, "including activities like Odyssey of the Mind, church groups and organized social activities. It doesn't have to be an organized group, but given the time constraints in society today there's probably more chance of success that way."

The problems are similar in Israel, the researchers say, where Beer-Sheva children frequently are drawn to television and computer games, while much of their socializing occurs through school and sports. Israeli children also know something about living in a "fear-based age," O'Malley added.

"This is a small and limited study," she said, "but it did raise my awareness of the need to be cognizant of providing opportunities for my own children to develop their social skills."

As a sidelight to the study, O'Malley said the difference in artistic skills between Corvallis youths and Beer-Sheva youths was pronounced. The declining emphasis on art in public schools - a victim of budget cuts in many Oregon districts - has implications beyond just drawing, she added.

"Art is a form of self-expression that develops analytical skills and stimulates different parts of the brain than other learning activities," O'Malley said. "It teaches nuance - and appreciation of nuance - that system-based learning cannot, and builds confidence in children. It is clear that the Israeli children have had more art instruction; their drawings used more color, had more detail and were more facile."

O'Malley said she and other Oregon educators are looking for new and better ways to bring more art instruction back into public schools.