What is gestalt psychology?

Answer 1

The Theory

Gestalt psychology is based on the observation that we often experience things that are not a part of our simple sensations. The original observation was Wertheimer’s, when he noted that we perceive motion where there is nothing more than a rapid sequence of individual sensory events. This is what he saw in the toy stroboscope he bought at the Frankfurt train station, and what he saw in his laboratory when he experimented with lights flashing in rapid succession (like the Christmas lights that appear to course around the tree, or the fancy neon signs in Los Vegas that seem to move). The effect is called the phi phenomenon, and it is actually the basic principle of motion pictures!

If we see what is not there, what is it that we are seeing? You could call it an illusion, but its not an hallucination. Wetheimer explained that you are seeing an effect of the whole event, not contained in the sum of the parts. We see a coursing string of lights, even though only one light lights at a time, because the whole event contains relationships among the individual lights that we experience as well.

Furthermore, say the Gestalt psychologists, we are built to experience the structured whole as well as the individual sensations. And not only do we have the ability to do so, we have a strong tendency to do so. We even add structure to events which do not have gestalt structural qualities.

In perception, there are many organizing principles called gestalt laws. The most general version is called the law of pragnanz. Pragnanz is German for pregnant, but in the sense of pregnant with meaning, rather than pregnant with child. This law says that we are innately driven to experience things in as good a gestalt as possible. “Good” can mean many things here, such a regular, orderly, simplicity, symmetry, and so on, which then refer to specific gestalt laws.

Answer 2

"a school of psychology, developed in Germany, which affirms that all experience consists of gestalten, and that the response of an organism to a situation is a complete and unanalyzable whole rather than a sum of the responses to specific elements in the situation."

Gestalten is the plural of gestalt. "in Gestalt psychology, any of the integrated structures or patterns that make up all experience and have specific properties which can neither be derived from the elements of the whole nor considered simply as the sum of these elements."

The above came from Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language, 2d college edition, c1984.

For more information, check with your local public/school library, which will undoubtedly have dictionaries/encyclopedias of psychology.

Answer 3

I love that word: gestalt... I like to think of myself as having a worldview that considers the whole "gestalt" of life.

Gestalt psychology (also Gestalt theory of the Berlin School) is a theory of mind and brain that proposes that the operational principle of the brain is holistic, parallel, and analog, with self-organizing tendencies; or, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The classic Gestalt example is a soap bubble, whose spherical shape (its Gestalt) is not defined by a rigid template, or a mathematical formula, but rather it emerges spontaneously by the parallel action of surface tension acting at all points in the surface simultaneously. This is in contrast to the "atomistic" principle of operation of the digital computer, where every computation is broken down into a sequence of simple steps, each of which is computed independently of the problem as a whole. The Gestalt effect refers to the form-forming capability of our senses, particularly with respect to the visual recognition of figures and whole forms instead of just a collection of simple lines and curves. The major problem with the Gestalt theory of perception is that they are descriptive not explanatory. Gestalt theories of visual perception, especially the Law of Pragnanz have been largely discredited by progess in computational neuroscience.

Gestalt psychology began as a reaction to the behaviorism of Watson and the introspectionism of Titchner. Gestalt’s argument with behaviorism was the focus on systematic collection and analysis of data from the bottom up; investigating the elements individually without an appreciation for their importance as a whole that was greater than the sum of their parts. This concept, of an integrated whole, is described by the German word Gestalt, for which there is no English equivalent. Gestalt psychologists apply this concept to relationships between people, citing the group dynamic of a common enterprise where each individual puts forth his gifts to create something more meaningful than each member could individually.

Answer 4

Gestalt formed a theory on how people are perceived used greatly in crime novels
Its preceeded quite frquently by
he seemed to be.....

so its perceptional

it has abranch in psychology and psychotherapy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestalt

Answer 5

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