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Woman in a White Shirt - Lucian Freud. Gestalt therapy. Gestalt therapy is an existential/experiential form of psychotherapy that emphasizes personal responsibility, and that focuses upon the individual's experience in the present moment, the therapist-client relationship, the environmental and social contexts of a person's life, and the self-regulating adjustments people make as a result of their overall situation. §Overview[edit] Edwin Nevis described Gestalt therapy as "a conceptual and methodological base from which helping professionals can craft their practice".[1] In the same volume Joel Latner stated that Gestalt therapy is built upon two central ideas: that the most helpful focus of psychotherapy is the experiential present moment, and that everyone is caught in webs of relationships; thus, it is only possible to know ourselves against the background of our relationship to the other.[2] The historical development of Gestalt therapy (described below) discloses the influences that generated these two ideas.

§Experimental freedom[edit] Travel news. Case-based reasoning. It has been argued that case-based reasoning is not only a powerful method for computer reasoning, but also a pervasive behavior in everyday human problem solving; or, more radically, that all reasoning is based on past cases personally experienced. This view is related to prototype theory, which is most deeply explored in cognitive science. Process[edit] Case-based reasoning has been formalized for purposes of computer reasoning as a four-step process:[1] Retrieve: Given a target problem, retrieve from memory cases relevant to solving it.

A case consists of a problem, its solution, and, typically, annotations about how the solution was derived. For example, suppose Fred wants to prepare blueberry pancakes. Being a novice cook, the most relevant experience he can recall is one in which he successfully made plain pancakes. Comparison to other methods[edit] At first glance, CBR may seem similar to the rule induction algorithms[2] of machine learning. Criticism[edit] History[edit] List of cognitive biases. Systematic patterns of deviation from norm or rationality in judgment Cognitive biases are systematic patterns of deviation from norm and/or rationality in judgment. They are often studied in psychology, sociology and behavioral economics.[1] Although the reality of most of these biases is confirmed by reproducible research,[2][3] there are often controversies about how to classify these biases or how to explain them.[4] Several theoretical causes are known for some cognitive biases, which provides a classification of biases by their common generative mechanism (such as noisy information-processing[5]).

Gerd Gigerenzer has criticized the framing of cognitive biases as errors in judgment, and favors interpreting them as arising from rational deviations from logical thought.[6] Explanations include information-processing rules (i.e., mental shortcuts), called heuristics, that the brain uses to produce decisions or judgments. Belief, decision-making and behavioral[edit] Anchoring bias[edit]

Interpersonal attraction. Interpersonal attraction is the attraction between people which leads to friendships and romantic relationships. Interpersonal attraction, the process, is distinct from perceptions of physical attractiveness which involves views of what is and is not considered beautiful or attractive. The study of interpersonal attraction is a major area of research in social psychology.

Interpersonal attraction is related to how much we like, dislike, or hate someone. It can be viewed as a force acting between two people that tends to draw them together and resist their separation. When measuring interpersonal attraction, one must refer to the qualities of the attracted as well as the qualities of the attractor to achieve predictive accuracy. It is suggested that to determine attraction, personality and situation must be taken into account.

Measurement[edit] Causes[edit] Propinquity effect[edit] Mere exposure/exposure effect[edit] Similarity attraction effect[edit] Similarity in different aspects[edit] Nucleic acid double helix. In molecular biology, the term double helix[1] refers to the structure formed by double-stranded molecules of nucleic acids such as DNA. The double helical structure of a nucleic acid complex arises as a consequence of its secondary structure, and is a fundamental component in determining its tertiary structure. The term entered popular culture with the publication in 1968 of The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA, by James Watson. The DNA double helix polymer of nucleic acids, held together by nucleotides which base pair together.[2] In B-DNA, the most common double helical structure, the double helix is right-handed with about 10–10.5 nucleotides per turn.[3] The double helix structure of DNA contains a major groove and minor groove, the major groove being wider than the minor groove.[2] Given the difference in widths of the major groove and minor groove, many proteins which bind to DNA do so through the wider major groove.[4] History[edit]

K-line (artificial intelligence) A K-line, or Knowledge-line, is a mental agent which represents an association of a group of other mental agents found active when a subject solves a certain problem or formulates a new idea. These were first described in Marvin Minsky's essay K-lines: A Theory of Memory, published in 1980 in the journal Cognitive Science: When you “get an idea,” or “solve a problem” […] you create what we shall call a K-line. […]…When that K-line is later “activated”, it reactivates […] mental agencies, creating a partial mental state “resembling the original.”[1] "Whenever you 'get a good idea', solve a problem, or have a memorable experience, you activate a K-line to 'represent' it. A K-line is a wirelike structure that attaches itself to whichever mental agents are active when you solve a problem or have a good idea.When you activate that K-line later, the agents attached to it are aroused, putting you into a 'mental state' much like the one you were in when you solved that problem or got that idea.

Functional fixedness. Functional fixedness is a cognitive bias that limits a person to using an object only in the way it is traditionally used. The concept of functional fixedness originated in Gestalt Psychology, a movement in psychology that emphasizes holistic processing. Karl Duncker defined functional fixedness as being a "mental block against using an object in a new way that is required to solve a problem. "[1] This "block" limits the ability of an individual to use components given to them to complete a task, as they cannot move past the original purpose of those components. For example, if someone needs a paperweight, but they only have a hammer, they may not see how the hammer can be used as a paperweight.

Functional fixedness is this inability to see a hammer's use as anything other than for pounding nails; the person couldn't think to use the hammer in a way other than in its conventional function. When tested, 5-year-old children show no signs of functional fixedness. Examples in research[edit] Eternity puzzle. An empty Eternity board Eternity is a tiling puzzle created by Christopher Monckton and launched by the Ertl Company in June 1999.

Consisting of 209 pieces, it was marketed as being practically unsolveable, with a £1 million prize on offer for whoever could solve it within four years. The prize was paid out in October 2000 for a winning solution arrived at by two mathematicians from Cambridge.[1] A second puzzle, Eternity II, was launched in Summer 2007 with a prize of US$2 million.[2] Puzzle[edit] The puzzle consists of filling a large almost regular dodecagon with 209 irregularly shaped smaller polygon pieces of the same color. All the pieces were made from a combination of equilateral triangles and half-triangles, with each piece having the same total area of 6 of those triangles, and between seven and eleven sides.[1][3] Retail[edit] Prize[edit] Solution[edit] Inspirations[edit] References[edit] External links[edit] Category:Recreational mathematics.

Symmetry. Sphere symmetrical group o representing an octahedral rotational symmetry. The yellow region shows the fundamental domain. Symmetry (from Greek συμμετρία symmetria "agreement in dimensions, due proportion, arrangement")[1] has two meanings. The first is a vague sense of harmonious and beautiful proportion and balance.[2][3] The second is an exact mathematical "patterned self-similarity" that can be demonstrated with the rules of a formal system, such as geometry or physics.

Although these two meanings of "symmetry" can sometimes be told apart, they are related, so they are here discussed together.[3] Mathematical symmetry may be observed This article describes these notions of symmetry from four perspectives. The opposite of symmetry is asymmetry. Geometry[edit] A geometric object is typically symmetric only under a subgroup of isometries. Reflectional symmetry[edit] An isosceles triangle with mirror symmetry. A drawing of a butterfly with bilateral symmetry Rotational symmetry[edit] . Abstraction. Abstraction is a process by which concepts are derived from the usage and classification of literal ("real" or "concrete") concepts, first principles, or other methods.

"An abstraction" is the product of this process—a concept that acts as a super-categorical noun for all subordinate concepts, and connects any related concepts as a group, field, or category.[1] Abstractions may be formed by reducing the information content of a concept or an observable phenomenon, typically to retain only information which is relevant for a particular purpose. For example, abstracting a leather soccer ball to the more general idea of a ball retains only the information on general ball attributes and behavior, eliminating the other characteristics of that particular ball.[1] Origins[edit] Thinking in abstractions is considered[by whom?] To be one of the key traits in modern human behaviour, which is believed to have developed between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago. Thought process[edit] Cat on Mat (picture 1) Gestalt psychology.

Gestalt psychology or gestaltism (German: Gestalt – "shape or form") is a theory of mind of the Berlin School. The central principle of gestalt psychology is that the mind forms a global whole with self-organizing tendencies. This principle maintains that the human mind considers objects in their entirety before, or in parallel with, perception of their individual parts; suggesting the whole is other than the sum of its parts.

Gestalt psychology tries to understand the laws of our ability to acquire and maintain meaningful perceptions in an apparently chaotic world. In the domain of perception, Gestalt psychologists stipulate that perceptions are the products of complex interactions among various stimuli. Origins[edit] Both von Ehrenfels and Edmund Husserl seem to have been inspired by Mach's work Beiträge zur Analyse der Empfindungen (Contributions to the Analysis of Sensations, 1886), in formulating their very similar concepts of gestalt and figural moment, respectively. Reification. Problem solving. Problem solving consists of using generic or ad hoc methods, in an orderly manner, for finding solutions to problems.

Some of the problem-solving techniques developed and used in artificial intelligence, computer science, engineering, mathematics, medicine, etc. are related to mental problem-solving techniques studied in psychology. Definition[edit] The term problem-solving is used in many disciplines, sometimes with different perspectives, and often with different terminologies. For instance, it is a mental process in psychology and a computerized process in computer science. Problems can also be classified into two different types (ill-defined and well-defined) from which appropriate solutions are to be made. Ill-defined problems are those that do not have clear goals, solution paths, or expected solution. Well-defined problems have specific goals, clearly defined solution paths, and clear expected solutions. Psychology[edit] Clinical psychology[edit] Cognitive sciences[edit] Europe[edit]