Researchers have found a strong relationship between children's graphic imagery and the visual sources surrounding them. Children's imagination is not simply a personal, subjective mind state, but is strongly attached to visual and cultural traditions. Based on this concept, a study explored how children's imagination is related to their socio-cultural environment. Data came from a pool of thousands of drawings collected in three U.S. midwestern suburban school communities and several suburban and rural school communities in Taiwan. The collection of drawings was based on "Clark's Drawing Abilities Test," that includes four items: (1) draw a house; (2) draw a person running very fast; (3) draw a group of friends playing on a playground, and (4) draw a fantasy world of your imagination. A sample of 200 drawings was drawn from each cultural group. Only drawings of a fantasy world by sixth and eighth grade students were used in this study. Children's depictions of a fantasy world revealed discernable patterns in subject matter selection and thematic manipulation and were classified into 20 subject areas. Among U.S. students "fairy lands," or "fairy tales" was the most popular subject, followed by "place" and "people." Among Taiwanese students, "people" was the most favored subject, while "space" was the second, and "plants, food, objects" the third. Both U.S. and Taiwanese children adopted themes, stories, and characters from fairy tales and myths of their own cultures. Both groups were inspired by the process of anthropomorphism, for instance, talking animals and smiling plants. The repertoire of children's graphic expression changes at a pace that matches the pace of changes in the modern world. What is popular in the United States becomes well-known in Taiwan as well. Contains a figure, a table of data, and 6 references. (BT)