The inclination of artists to partition line sections in the golden ratio

A sample of 51 mature, established, and successful artists and sculptors were invited to partition line segments with a pencil mark so that the resulting two line segments formed the most pleasing proportion. It was anticipated that this particular group of subjects would choose the golden section. However, the proportion of 1:2 and not the golden section was the over-all ratio of choice. These data were contrasted with those obtained in similar but earlier work conducted by another researcher who tested psychology students as subjects.