GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY.pptx

Gestalt psychology, school of psychology founded in the 20th century that provided the foundation for the modern study of perception. Gestalt theory emphasizes that the whole of anything is greater than its parts. That is, the attributes of the whole are not deducible from analysis of the parts in isolation.Gestalt Psychology Founder: Wolfgang Köhler, Max Wertheimer, and Kurt Koffka are the gestalt psychology founder.

1. GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY

2. BASIC CONCEPTS: We will cover these basic concepts: What is Gestalt Psychology and wholistic view Gestalt Principle & gestalt perception Emergence & evolution Key Theorists Conclusion Strengths & weaknesses of this Perspective Laws of Gestalt Psychology

3. GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY ‘ Gestalt’ is a German word which   literally means form or pattern. In psychology, gestalt means ‘ a unified whole’ . Gestalt psychology looks at the behaviours and mind as a whole. This school of thought was given in opposition to Structuralism in which psychologists studied the mental processes in bits and contents and not the whole mental process.

4. GESTALT PRINCIPLE: ‘’Whole is not simply the same as the sum of its parts’’ Our brains tend to perceive things as a part of something larger and more complex . For example : Take the example of this bicycle and tree, this shows how people look at the things around them as a whole and not their individual elements.

5. GESTALT PERCEPTION: Method by which people take all the sensations they experience at any given moment and interpret them in some meaningful fashion. No two people will perceive the same thing in the same manner. Humans perceive things as a whole Sometimes people tend to perceive things according to the surroundings.

6. More Examples?

7. LOOK AT THESE!

8. KEY THEORISTS:

9. CONTRIBUTIONS: MAX WURTHEIMER : He was the founder of Gestalt psychology. He gave the Phi Phenomenon which describes our tendency of observing movements when there is no movement. WOLFGANG KÖHLER: Cofounder of Gestalt psychology, made many important contributions to science Best known for his study on chimpanzee problem solving (The Mentality of Apes ) experiment . PHI PHENOMENON CHIMPANZEE EXPERIMENT

10. CONT… Kurt koffka He was one of the co-founders of gestalt psychology & student of Max Wertheimer. He worked on human psychological development and said children perceive the world holistically and respond to stimuli in the same way. He said, with the years we acquire the ability to distinguish the parts that make up each set .

11. Laws Of Gestalt Psychology Gestalt principles of form perception. The gestalt psychologists discovered a set of laws of perceptual organization Proximity (nearness) Similarity Closure Simplicity ( pragnanz ) Figure and ground Continuity Commen fat Enclosure and connectivity

12. PROXIMITY (NEARNESS ) The tendency to perceive objects that are close to each other as part of the same grouping (physical or geographical nearness).

13. PROXIMITY

14. PROXIMITY EXAMPLES?

15. SIMILARITY What is the law of similarity?

16. SIMILARITY Stimuli that are similar to each other tend to be grouped togeth er

17. SIMILARITY

18. SIMILARITY Real life example?

19. CLOSURE We tend to fill in gaps in an incomplete image to create a complete, whole object .

20. CLOSURE

21. CLOSURE Daily life example A talented artist can give the impression of an entire face with just a few cleverly placed strokes of the pen or brush,the viewers fill in the details.

22. SIMPLICITY What is simplicity?

23. (SIMPLICITY (PRAGNANZ) The word pragnanz is a german term meaning “GOOD FIGURE”. The law of pragnanz sometimes referred to as the law of simplicity. We tend to perceive the objects in simplest possible form.

24. SIMPLICITY(PRAGNANZ) EXAMPLE

25. Daily life example SIMPLICYT(PRAGNANZ)

26. FIGURE AND GROUND What is figure and ground?

27. People inherently distinguish between figure (the object they are viewing , sound to whi ch they are listening , etc) and ground ( background). FIGURE AND GROUND

28. FIGURE AND GROUND

29. FIGURE AND GROUND 1 29

30. FIGURE AND GROUND 1 30

31. Cont… Q/A?

32. LAW OF CONTINUITY: When visual elements are aligned with each other, our visual perception is biased to perceive them as continuous forms rather than disconnected segments.

33. EXAMPLE:

34. LAW OF ENCLOSURE AND CONNECTIVITY: We perceive objects as belonging to a group when they are enclosed in a way that creates a boundary or border around them.

35. COMMON FATE: Objects functioning or moving in the same direction appear to belong together, that is, they are perceived as a single unit.

36. Any Examples?

37. STRENGTHS OF GESTALT APPROACH: Its applicability in the day to day life and simplicity of its ideas. Better understanding on how we interpret and perceive the realities. Their suggestions on creative problem solving and productive thinking and the inputs shared by them in Gestalt therapies related to promoting personal growth are true value additions.

38. LIMITATIONS OF GESTALT APPROACH:  Too individualistic, which may encourage selfish behavior on the part of the individuals.  They give more importance to understanding oneself first before understanding others. Secondly, some of the critics considered the laws of perceptual organization to be unscientific, ambiguous and vague lacking practical relevance.

39. Q / A

40. THANK YOU