Gestalt Principles. 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. Constructive Aspect of Visual Perception: A Gestalt Field Theory Principle of Visual Reification Suggests a Phase Conjugate.
By Steven Lehar Many Gestalt illusions reveal a constructive, or generative aspect of perceptual processing where the experience contains more explicit spatial information than the visual stimulus on which it is based. The experience of Gestalt illusions often appears as volumetric spatial structures bounded by continuous colored surfaces embedded in a volumetric space. These, and many other phenomena, suggest a field theory principle of visual representation and computation in the brain. That is, an essential aspect of neurocomputation involves extended spatial fields of energy interacting in lawful ways across the tissue of the brain, as a spatial computation taking place in a spatial medium. Introduction There are many aspects of sensory and perceptual experience that exhibit a continuous spatial nature suggestive of a field theory principle of computation and/or representation in the brain. Figure 1. Field Theory Grassfire Metaphor Figure 2. Explicit versus Implicit Representation.
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] Gestalt Vid etc....