Gestalt psychology

phenomenology

attempting to understand human behavior and consciousness from the individual subjective point of view

Gestalt's (molar) motto

"The whole is different from the sum of the parts"

3 contributions of Max Wertheimer

1. Founded Gestalt psychology. 2. Illustrated that structuralism could not account for the phi phenomenon. 3. Also, did important work in education, problem-solving, and creativity.

3 big attacks on Gestalt psychology

1. Too much theory/too little research 2. Research was qualitative rather than quantitative. 3. Physiological explanations for the phenomena they observed were incorrect.

3 Gestalt attacks on behaviorism

1. Too reductionistic 2. Failure to study thoughts 3. Trial and error learning experiments prevented subjects from using insight because subjects were not allowed to see the whole situation

Gestalt psychology

A school that adopted a molar approach to studying both thoughts and behavior.

Christian von Ehrenfels

Coined the term Gestaltqualitaten: that the whole (the form) has characteristics that (a) are immediately perceived and (b) do not belong to any pieces of the whole (e.g., the circle has a whole is circular, but the dots making it up may not be).

Immanuel Kant

Great philosopher. Our interest is in his ideas that ran counter to the British empiricists, specifically, that time, infinity, cause-effect, and other concepts could not be learned from experience and are instead categories that we are born to create. These ideas emphasize that our minds are active rather than passive) and were central to Gestalt psychology.

Wolfgang Kohler

His studies suggested that animals could solve problems without trial and error. Instead, they seemed to demonstrate "insight" (e.g., they might in apes when they used sticks to reach a banana that was out of reach). These studies, and his transposition studies, put him in sharp contrast with Thorndike.

Gestalt's biggest contribution

Legitimizing the study of conscious thoughts. This legitimized both cognitive psychology and humanistic psychology.

Kurt Koffka

One of the Big 3 Gestaltists. Introduced Gestalt Psychology to the U.S. with his Psychological Bulletin article "Perception: An introduction to Gestalt-Theorie." His article may have hurt, rather than helped, Gestalt psychology becoming a force in American psychology.

3 Fundamental differences between Watson and Gestalt psychologists

Relative to Watson, Gestalt psychologists had 1. a more molar approach, 2. placed more emphasis on nature, 3. saw organisms as more active and more complex.

anti-reductionism

The molar approach. The Gestalt psychologists argued that reduction of phenomena into their elements was either impossible (e.g., the phi phenomenon) or subjective (e.g., Wundtian introspection, breaking light into waves).

Productive thinking

Wertheimer's term to suggest that creative thinking (as opposed to reproductive thinking) involved reorganizing/regrouping the pieces of the problem.

Gestalt psychology's big 3

Wertheimer, Koffka, and Kohler

phi phenomenon

an illusion of movement produced by visual stimuli presented in rapid succession (e.g., a series of slides is seen as a movie. flashing neon lights on a hotel sign may suggest that the lights are moving around the sign). One reason this illusion launched Gestalt psychology is that structuralists could not explain it because, in this illusion, the whole of the person's experience (moving lights) is different from the individual parts (the lights going on and off).

Gestalt

an organized whole; pattern; form; configuration;