Methods of Gestalt psychology briefly. Gestalt psychology in simple words

At the beginning of the 20th century in Germany, Max Wertheimer, experimentally studying the features of visual perception, proved the following fact: the whole cannot be reduced to the sum of its parts. And this central position became fundamental in Gestalt psychology. It can be noted that the views of this psychological movement contradict the theory of Wilhelm Wundt, in which he highlighted the elements of consciousness. So, in one of his scientific studies, W. Wundt gives the subject a book and asks him to evaluate what he sees. At first, the subject says that he sees a book, but then, when the experimenter asks him to look more closely, he begins to notice its shape, color, and the material from which the book is made.

The ideas of Gestaltists differ; they believe that it is impossible to describe the world from the point of view of dividing it into elements. In 1912, M. Wertheimer’s work “Experimental Studies of the Perception of Motion” was published, in which he, using an experiment with a strobe light, shows that movement cannot be reduced to the sum of two points. It should be noted that this same year is the year of birth of Gestalt psychology. Subsequently, the work of M. Wertheimer gained great popularity in the world and soon a school of Gestalt psychology appeared in Berlin, which included such popular scientific figures as Max Wertheimer himself, Wolfgang Köhler, Kurt Koffka, Kurt Lewin and other researchers. The main task facing the new scientific direction was to transfer the laws of physics to mental phenomena.

Basic ideas of Gestalt psychology

The main concept of Gestalt psychology is the concept of Gestalt. Gestalt is a pattern, configuration, a certain form of organization of individual parts that creates wholeness. Thus, Gestalt is a structure that is holistic and has special qualities, in contrast to the sum of its components. For example, a portrait of a person usually has a certain set of constituent elements, but the human image itself is perceived in completely different ways in each individual case. In order to prove the fact regarding integrity, M. Wertheimer conducted an experiment with a strobe light, which made it possible to observe the illusion of movement of two light sources that light up alternately. This phenomenon is called the phi phenomenon. The movement was illusory and existed exclusively in this form; it could not be divided into separate components.

In his subsequent studies, M. Wertheimer also extends his views regarding other mental phenomena. He views thinking as an alternating change of gestalts, that is, the ability to see the same problem from different angles, in accordance with the task.

Based on the above, we can highlight the main position of Gestalt psychology, which is as follows:

1) mental processes are initially holistic and have a certain structure. Elements can be identified in this structure, but all of them are secondary to it.

Thus, the subject of research in Gestalt psychology is consciousness, which is a dynamic integral structure where all elements are closely interconnected.

The next feature of perception that was studied in the school of Gestalt psychology, in addition to its integrity, was the constancy of perception:

2) constancy of perception represents the relative invariance of the perception of certain properties of objects when the conditions of their perception change. These properties include color or lighting constancy.

Based on such features of perception as integrity and constancy, Gestaltists highlight the principles of the organization of perception. They note that the organization of perception occurs precisely at the moment when a person turns his attention to the object of interest to him. At this time, parts of the perceived field are connected to each other and become one.

M. Wertheimer identified a number of principles according to which the organization of perception occurs:

The principle of proximity. Elements located next to each other in time and space are combined with each other and form a single form.
The principle of similarity. Similar elements are perceived as one, forming a kind of vicious circle.
The principle of closure. There is a tendency for humans to complete unfinished figures.
The principle of integrity. A person completes incomplete figures into a simple whole (there is a tendency to simplify the whole).
The principle of figure and ground. Everything that a person assigns a certain meaning is perceived by him as a figure against a less structured background.

Development of perception according to Koffka

Kurt Koffka's research made it possible to understand how human perception is formed. After conducting a series of experiments, he was able to establish that a child is born with unformed gestalts, unclear images of the outside world. For example, any change in the appearance of a loved one can lead to the child not recognizing him. K. Koffka suggested that gestalts, as images of the external world, are formed in a person with age and over time acquire more precise meanings, become clearer and differentiated.

Studying color perception in more detail, K. Koffka substantiated the fact that people do not distinguish colors as such, but their relationships among themselves. Considering the process of development of color perception over time, K. Koffka notes that initially a child is able to distinguish among themselves only those objects that have a certain color and those that do not have color. Moreover, the colored ones stand out to him as figures, and the uncolored ones are seen by him as the background. Then, to complete the gestalt, warm and cold shades are added, and already at an older age these shades begin to be divided into more specific colors. However, colored objects are perceived by the child only as figures located against a certain background. Thus, the scientist concluded that the main role in the formation of perception is played by the figure and the background against which it is presented. And the law according to which a person perceives not the colors themselves, but their relationship, is called “transduction.”

Unlike the background, the figure has a brighter color. However, there is also the phenomenon of a reversible figure. This occurs when, upon prolonged examination, the perception of an object changes, and then the background can become the main figure, and the figure - the background.

The concept of insight according to Köhler

Experiments with chimpanzees allowed Wolfgang Köhler to understand that the task assigned to an animal is solved either by trial and error or through sudden awareness. Based on his experiments, W. Köhler made the following conclusion: objects that are in the animal’s field of perception and that are in no way connected with each other, in the process of solving a particular problem, begin to connect into some single structure, the vision of which helps to resolve the problem situation. This structuring occurs instantly; in other words, insight occurs, which means awareness.

To prove that a person solves certain problems in a similar way, that is, thanks to the phenomenon of insight, W. Köhler conducted a number of interesting experiments to study the thought process of children. He posed a task for the children similar to the one posed for the monkeys. For example, they were asked to get a toy that was high on the cabinet. At first, in their field of perception there was only a closet and a toy. Next, they paid attention to the ladder, chair, box and other objects, and realized that they could be used to get the toy. In this way, a gestalt was formed and it became possible to solve the problem.

W. Köhler believed that the initial understanding of the general picture, after some time, is replaced by a more detailed differentiation and on the basis of this a new gestalt, more adequate for a specific situation, is already formed.

Thus, W. Köhler defined insight as solving a problem based on capturing logical connections between stimuli or events.

Lewin's dynamic theory of personality

From Kurt Lewin's point of view, the main gestalt is a field that functions as a single space, and individual elements are pulled towards it. Personality exists in a charged psychological field of elements. The valence of each item that is in this field can be either positive or negative. The variety of objects surrounding a person contributes to the emergence of his needs. The existence of such needs can be manifested by the presence of a feeling of tension. Thus, to achieve a harmonious state, a person needs to satisfy his needs.

Based on the basic ideas and principles of Gestalt psychology, Gestalt therapy was created in the mid-20th century by Frederick Perls.

Gestalt therapy according to Perls

The main idea of this therapy is the following: a person and everything that surrounds him is a single whole.

Gestalt therapy assumes that a person’s entire life consists of an infinite number of gestalts. Every event that happens to a person is a kind of gestalt, each of which has a beginning and an end. The important point is that any gestalt must be completed. However, completion is possible only when the human need that resulted in this or that gestalt is satisfied.

Thus, all Gestalt therapy is based on the need to complete unfinished business. However, there are various factors that can prevent the perfect completion of the gestalt. The incompleteness of the gestalt can manifest itself throughout a person’s life and interfere with his harmonious existence. In order to help a person get rid of excess tension, Gestalt therapy offers various techniques and exercises.

Using these techniques, Gestalt therapists help patients see and understand how unfinished Gestalts affect their lives in the present, and also help complete unfinished Gestalts.

An example of these techniques are exercises that are aimed at understanding oneself and others. Gestalt therapists call these techniques games in which the patient conducts an internal dialogue with himself, or builds a dialogue with parts of his own personality.

The most popular is the “empty chair” technique. For this technique, two chairs are used, which must be placed opposite each other. On one of which there is a fictitious interlocutor, and on the other - the patient, the main participant in the game. The main idea of the technique is that the patient gets the opportunity to play out the internal dialogue, identifying himself with his subpersonalities.

Thus, for Gestalt psychology, the fact that a person is an integral personality is integral. The constant development of this scientific direction to this day allows us to develop new methods of working with different patients. Gestalt therapy currently helps individuals make their lives more and more meaningful, conscious and fulfilling, and therefore allows them to achieve a higher level of psychological and physical health.

Bibliography:

Wertheimer M. Productive thinking: Trans. from English/General ed. S. F. Gorbova and V. P. Zinchenko. Entry Art. V. P. Zinchenko. - M.: Progress, 1987.
Perls F. “Gestalt approach. Witness to therapy." - M.: Publishing House of the Institute of Psychotherapy, 2003.
Shultz D.P., Shultz S.E. History of modern psychology / Trans. from English A.V. Govorunov, V.I. Kuzin, L.L. Tsaruk / Ed. HELL. Nasledov. - St. Petersburg: Publishing house "Eurasia", 2002.
Koehler V. Study of the intelligence of anthropoid apes. - M., 1930.
http://psyera.ru/volfgang-keler-bio.htm

Editor: Bibikova Anna Aleksandrovna

Gestalt psychology(German gestalt - image, form) - a direction in Western psychology that arose in Germany in the first third of the twentieth century. and put forward a program for studying the psyche from the point of view of holistic structures (gestalts), primary in relation to their components.

Subject of Gestalt psychology: Phenomenal field

Representatives of Gestalt psychology: Wolfgang Keller, Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, Kurt Lewin

Gestalt psychology opposed the principle put forward by structural psychology of dividing consciousness into elements and constructing them according to the laws of association or creative synthesis of complex mental phenomena.

Representatives Gestalt psychology suggested that all the various manifestations of the psyche obey the laws of Gestalt. Parts tend to form a symmetrical whole, parts are grouped in the direction of maximum simplicity, proximity, balance. The tendency of every mental phenomenon is to take a definite, complete form.

Starting with the study of perception processes, Gestalt psychology She quickly expanded her topics to include problems of mental development, analysis of the intellectual behavior of great apes, consideration of memory, creative thinking, and the dynamics of individual needs.

The psyche of humans and animals was understood by Gestalt psychologists as an integral “phenomenal field” that has certain properties and structure. The main components of the phenomenal field are figures and ground. In other words, part of what we perceive appears clearly and meaningfully, while the rest is only vaguely present in our consciousness. The figure and background can change places. A number of representatives Gestalt psychology believed that the phenomenal field is isomorphic (similar) to the processes occurring inside the brain substrate.

The most important law obtained by Gestalt psychologists is the law of constancy of perception, which captures the fact that the entire image does not change when its sensory elements change (you see the world as stable, despite the fact that your position in space, illumination, etc. are constantly changing) The principle of a holistic analysis of the psyche has made possible scientific knowledge of the most complex problems of mental life, which were previously considered inaccessible to experimental research.

Gestalt psychology(German Gestalt - holistic form or structure) - school of psychology at the beginning of the 20th century. Founded by Max Wertheimer in 1912.

Basic theoretical principles Gestalt psychology:

Postulate: The primary data of psychology are integral structures (gestalts), which in principle cannot be derived from the components that form them. Gestalts have their own characteristics and laws, in particular, the “law of grouping”, “law of relationship” (figure/ground).

Gestalt (German: Gestalt - form, image, structure) is the spatially visual form of perceived objects, whose essential properties cannot be understood by summing up the properties of their parts. One striking example of this, according to Keller, is a melody, which is recognizable even if it is transposed to other elements. When we hear a melody for the second time, we recognize it thanks to memory. But if the composition of its elements changes, we will still recognize the melody as the same. Gestalt psychology owes its appearance to the German psychologists Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffke and Wolfgang Köller, who put forward a program for studying the psyche from the point of view of integral structures - gestalts. Opposing the principle put forward by psychology of dividing consciousness into elements and constructing complex mental phenomena from them, they proposed the idea of the integrity of the image and the irreducibility of its properties to the sum of the properties of the elements. According to the great theorists, the objects that make up our environment are perceived by the senses not as individual objects, but as organized forms. Perception is not reduced to the sum of sensations, and the properties of a figure are not described through the properties of its parts. Gestalt itself is a functional structure that organizes the diversity of individual phenomena.

Gestalt principles
All of the above properties of perception - constants, figure, background - in Gestalt psychology enter into relationships with each other and reveal a new property. This is gestalt, the quality of form. The integrity of perception and its orderliness are achieved thanks to the following principles Gestalt psychology:

Proximity. Stimuli located nearby tend to be perceived together.

Similarity. Stimuli that are similar in size, shape, color, or shape tend to be perceived together.

Integrity. Perception tends towards simplification and integrity.

Closedness. Reflects the tendency to complete the figure so that it takes on a full shape.

Adjacency. Proximity of stimuli in time and space. Contiguity can shape perception when one event causes another.

Common area. Gestalt principles shape our everyday perceptions, as well as learning and past experiences. Anticipatory thoughts and expectations also actively guide our interpretation of sensations.

Gestalt qualities

Formed gestalts are always wholes, complete structures, with clearly defined contours. The contour, characterized by the degree of sharpness and the closedness or openness of the outlines, is the basis of Gestalt.

When describing Gestalt, the concept of importance is also used. The whole can be important, the members unimportant, and vice versa, the Figure is always more important than the base. The importance can be distributed in such a way that the result is that all members are equally important (this is a rare case, which occurs, for example, in some ornaments).

Gestalt members come in different ranks. So, for example, in a circle: the 1st rank corresponds to the center, the 2nd rank is a point on the circle, the 3rd is any point inside the circle. Each gestalt has its own center of gravity, which acts either as a center of mass (for example, the middle in a disk), or as a point of attachment, or as a starting point (it seems that this point serves as the beginning for constructing the whole, for example, the base of a column), or as a guiding point (for example, the tip of an arrow).

The quality of “transpositivity” is manifested in the fact that the image of the whole remains, even if all parts change in their material, for example, if these are different keys of the same melody, and can be lost even if all elements are preserved, or in Picasso’s paintings ( for example, Picasso’s drawing “Cat”).

As the basic law of grouping individual elements into Gestalt psychology the law of pregnancy was postulated. Pregnancy (from Latin praegnans - meaningful, burdened, rich) is one of the key concepts Gestalt psychology, meaning the completion of the gestalts, which have acquired a balanced state, “good form.” Pregnant gestalts have the following properties: closed, clearly defined boundaries, symmetry, internal structure that takes the form of a figure. At the same time, factors were identified that contribute to the grouping of elements into integral gestalts, such as “proximity factor”, “similarity factor”, “good continuation factor”, “common fate factor”.

The law of “good” Gestalt, proclaimed by Metzger (1941), states: “Consciousness is always predisposed to perceive predominantly the simplest, the most unified, the closed, the symmetrical, and included in the main spatial axis, among the perceptions given together.” Deviations from “good” gestalts are not perceived immediately, but only upon intensive examination (for example, an approximately equilateral triangle is viewed as an equilateral triangle, an almost right angle is viewed as a right angle).

Constants of perception in Gestalt psychology

Size constancy in Gestalt psychology: The perceived size of an object remains constant, regardless of changes in the size of its image on the retina. Understanding simple things may seem natural or innate. However, in most cases it is formed through one's own experience. So in 1961, Colin Turnbull took a pygmy who lived in the dense African jungle to the endless African savannah. The pygmy, who had never seen objects at a great distance, perceived herds of buffalo as a collection of insects until he was brought closer to the animals.

Constancy of form in Gestalt psychology: is that the perceived shape of an object is constant as the shape on the retina changes. Just look at this page first straight and then at an angle. Despite the change in the “picture” of the page, the perception of its shape remains unchanged.

Brightness constancy in Gestalt psychology: The perceived brightness of an object is constant under changing lighting conditions. Naturally, subject to the same lighting of the object and the background.

Figure and ground in Gestalt psychology

The simplest formation of perception consists in dividing visual sensations into an object - a figure located against a background. Isolation of a figure from the background and retention of the object of perception includes psychophysiological mechanisms. Brain cells that receive visual information respond more actively when looking at a figure than when looking at a background (Lamme 1995). The figure is always pushed forward, the background is pushed back, the figure is richer in content than the background, brighter than the background. And a person thinks about the figure, and not about the background. However, their role and place in perception is determined by personal and social factors. Therefore, the phenomenon of a reversible figure becomes possible when, for example, during prolonged perception, the figure and the background change places.

Contributions of Gestalt psychology

Gestalt psychology believed that the whole is not derived from the sum of the properties and functions of its parts (the properties of the whole are not equal to the sum of the properties of its parts), but has a qualitatively higher level. Gestalt psychology changed the previous view of consciousness, proving that its analysis is designed to deal not with individual elements, but with holistic mental images. Gestalt psychology opposed associative psychology, which divides consciousness into elements. Gestalt psychology along with phenomenology and psychoanalysis, it formed the basis of Gestalt therapy by F. Perls, who transferred the ideas of Gestalt psychologists from cognitive processes to the level of understanding the world as a whole.

Gestalt - what is it? Many modern people ask this question, but not everyone manages to find the correct answer to it. The word “Gestalt” itself is of German origin. Translated into Russian it means “structure”, “image”, “form”.

This concept was introduced into psychiatry by psychoanalyst Frederick Perls. He is the founder of Gestalt therapy.

Frederick Perls was a practicing psychiatrist, so all the methods he developed were primarily used to treat mental disorders, including psychoses, neuroses, etc. However, the Gestalt therapy method became very widespread. Psychologists and psychiatrists working in different fields soon became interested in what it is. Such a wide popularity of Gestalt therapy is due to the presence of a reasonable and understandable theory, a wide choice of methods or patients, as well as a high level of effectiveness.

Main advantage

The main and greatest advantage is a holistic approach to a person, which takes into account his mental, physical, spiritual and social aspects. Gestalt therapy, instead of focusing on the question “Why is this happening to a person?” replaces it with the following: “What does a person feel now and how can this be changed?” Therapists working in this direction try to focus people's attention on awareness of the processes that happen to them “here and now.” Thus, the client learns to take responsibility for his life and for everything that happens in it, and, consequently, for making the desired changes.

Perls himself viewed Gestalt as a whole, the destruction of which leads to the production of fragments. The form strives to be unified, and if this does not happen, the person finds himself in an unfinished situation that puts pressure on him. There are often many unfinished gestalts hidden in people, which are not so difficult to get rid of, it’s enough to see them. The huge advantage is that to discover them there is no need to delve into the depths of the unconscious, but you just need to learn to notice the obvious.

The Gestalt approach is based on such principles and concepts as integrity, responsibility, the emergence and destruction of structures, unfinished forms, contact, awareness, “here and now.”

The most important principle

A person is a holistic being, and he cannot be divided into any components, for example, into body and psyche or soul and body, since such artificial techniques cannot positively affect his understanding of his own inner world.

A holistic gestalt consists of a personality and the space surrounding it, influencing each other. To better understand this principle, you can turn to the psychology of interpersonal relationships. It makes it possible to clearly monitor how much influence society has on an individual. However, by changing himself, he influences other people, who, in turn, also become different.

The Moscow Gestalt Institute, like many others, includes the concept of “contact” as a key concept. A person is constantly in contact with something or someone - with plants, the environment, other people, informational, bioenergetic and psychological fields.

The place where an individual comes into contact with the environment is usually called the contact boundary. The better a person feels and the more flexibly he can regulate the contact difference, the more successful he is in meeting his own needs and achieving his goals. However, this process is characterized by characteristic features that lead to disruption of the individual’s productive activity in various areas of interaction. Perls Gestalt therapy is aimed at overcoming such disorders.

The principle of the emergence and destruction of gestalt structures

Using the principle of the emergence and destruction of gestalt structures, one can easily explain the behavior of a person. Each person arranges his life depending on his own needs, to which he gives priority. His actions are aimed at meeting needs and achieving existing goals.

For a better understanding, you can consider several examples. So, a person who wants to buy a house saves money to buy it, finds a suitable option and becomes the owner of his own home. And those who want to have a child direct all their efforts to achieve this goal. After the desired is achieved (the need is satisfied), the gestalt is completed and destroyed.

The concept of an unfinished gestalt

However, not every gestalt reaches its completion (and then destruction). What happens to some people and why do they constantly form the same type of unfinished situations? This question has interested specialists in the field of psychology and psychiatry for many years. This phenomenon is called unfinished gestalt.

Specialists whose place of work is one or another Gestalt institute have managed to recognize that the lives of many people are often filled with constantly recurring typical negative situations. For example, a person, despite the fact that he does not like to be exploited, constantly finds himself in precisely such situations, and someone who does not have a good personal life comes into contact with people he does not need over and over again. Such “deviations” are associated precisely with incomplete “images”, and the human psyche will not be able to find peace until they reach their logical end.

That is, a person who has an incomplete “structure”, on a subconscious level, constantly strives to create a negative unfinished situation only in order to resolve it and finally close this issue. A Gestalt therapist artificially creates a similar situation for his client and helps him find a way out of it.

Awareness

Another basic concept of Gestalt therapy is awareness. It is worth noting that a person’s intellectual knowledge about his external and internal world has nothing to do with him. Gestalt psychology associates awareness with being in the so-called “here and now” state. It is characterized by the fact that a person performs all actions, guided by consciousness and being vigilant, and does not live a mechanical life, relying solely on the stimulus-reactive mechanism, as is typical of animals.

Most problems (if not all) appear in a person’s life for the reason that he is guided by the mind and not by consciousness. But, unfortunately, the mind is a rather limited function, and people who live only by it do not even suspect that they are actually something more. This leads to the replacement of the true state of reality with an intellectual and false one, and also to the fact that the life of each person takes place in a separate illusory world.

Gestalt therapists around the world, including the Moscow Gestalt Institute, are confident that to solve most problems, misunderstandings, misunderstandings and difficulties, a person only needs to achieve awareness of his internal and external reality. The state of awareness does not allow people to act badly by giving in to impulses of random emotions, since they are always able to see the world around them as it really is.

Responsibility

From a person’s awareness, another useful quality is born - responsibility. The level of responsibility for one’s life directly depends on the level of clarity of a person’s awareness of the surrounding reality. It is human nature to always shift responsibility for one’s failures and mistakes onto others or even higher powers, but everyone who manages to take responsibility for themselves makes a big leap on the path of individual development.

Most people are not at all familiar with the concept of gestalt. They will find out what it is at an appointment with a psychologist or psychotherapist. The specialist identifies the problem and develops ways to eliminate it. It is for this purpose that Gestalt therapy has a wide variety of techniques, among which there are both its own and those borrowed from such as transactional analysis, art therapy, psychodrama, etc. According to Gestaltists, within the framework of their approach, you can use any methods that serve as natural continuation of the “therapist-client” dialogue and strengthen the processes of awareness.

The principle of “here and now”

According to him, everything that really matters happens in the moment. The mind takes a person to the past (memories, analysis of past situations) or to the future (dreams, fantasies, planning), but does not give the opportunity to live in the present, which leads to life passing by. Gestalt therapists encourage each of their clients to live “here and now”, without looking into the illusory world. All the work of this approach is connected with awareness of the present moment.

Types of Gestalt techniques and contracting

All Gestalt therapy techniques are conventionally divided into “projective” and “dialogue”. The former are used to work with dreams, images, imaginary dialogues, etc.

The latter represent painstaking work that is carried out by the therapist at the border of contact with the client. The specialist, having tracked the interruption mechanisms of the person with whom he is working, turns his emotions and experiences into part of his environment, and then brings them to the boundary of contact. It is worth noting that Gestalt techniques of both types are intertwined in work, and a clear distinction between them is possible only in theory.

The Gestalt therapy procedure, as a rule, begins with such a technique as concluding a contract. This direction is characterized by the fact that the specialist and the client are equal partners, and the latter bears no less responsibility for the results of the work performed than the former. This aspect is precisely discussed at the stage of concluding the contract. At the same moment, the client forms his goals. It is very difficult for a person who constantly avoids responsibility to agree to such conditions, and already at this stage he needs work. At the stage of concluding a contract, a person begins to learn to be responsible for himself and for what happens to him.

"Hot chair" and "empty chair"

The “hot chair” technique is one of the most famous among therapists whose place of work is the Moscow Gestalt Institute and many other structures. This method is used for group work. A “hot chair” is a place where a person sits who intends to tell those present about his difficulties. During the work, only the client and the therapist interact with each other, the rest of the group members listen silently, and only at the end of the session talk about how they felt.

The basic Gestalt techniques also include the “empty chair”. It is used to place a person significant to the client with whom he can conduct a dialogue, and it does not matter so much whether he is currently alive or has already died. Another purpose of the “empty chair” is dialogue between different parts of the personality. This is necessary when the client has opposite attitudes that generate

Concentration and experimental enhancement

The Gestalt Institute calls its original technique concentration (focused awareness). There are three levels of awareness - internal worlds (emotions, bodily sensations), external worlds (what I see, hear), and thoughts. Keeping in mind one of the main principles of Gestalt therapy “here and now,” the client tells the specialist about his awareness at the moment. For example: “Now I’m lying on the couch and looking at the ceiling. I just can't relax. My heart is beating very hard. I know there is a therapist next to me.” This technique enhances the sense of the present, helps to understand the ways in which a person is removed from reality, and is also valuable information for further work with him.

Another effective technique is experimental amplification. It consists in maximizing any verbal and non-verbal manifestations that are little realized by him. For example, in a case where a client, without realizing it, often begins his conversation with the words “yes, but...”, the therapist can suggest that he begin each phrase this way, and then the person becomes aware of his competition with others and the desire to always have the last word. .

Working with Polarities

This is another method that Gestalt therapy often uses. Techniques in this field are often aimed at identifying opposites in a person. Among them, working with polarities occupies a special place.

For example, for a person who constantly complains that he doubts himself, a specialist suggests that those who are confident try to communicate with the people around him from this position. It is equally useful to have a dialogue between your uncertainty and confidence.

For a client who does not know how to ask for help, the Gestalt therapist suggests turning to group members, sometimes even with very ridiculous requests. This technique makes it possible to expand the individual’s zone of awareness by including previously inaccessible personal potential.

Working with dreams

This technique is used by psychotherapists of various directions, but the original Gestalt method has features that are characteristic only of it. Here, the specialist considers all elements of sleep as parts of the human personality, with each of which the client must identify. This is done to appropriate one’s own projections or get rid of retroflections. In addition, in this technique no one has canceled the use of the “here and now” principle.

Thus, the client should tell the therapist about his dream as if it were something happening in the present time. For example: “I am running along a forest path. I’m in a great mood and I enjoy every moment spent in this forest, etc.” It is necessary for the client to describe his dream “here and now” not only on his own behalf, but also on behalf of other people and objects present in the vision. For example, “I am a winding forest path. A person is running towards me now, etc.”

Thanks to its own and borrowed techniques, Gestalt therapy helps people get rid of all kinds of masks and establish trusting contact with others. The Gestalt approach takes into account heredity, the experience acquired in the first years of life, the influence of society, but at the same time it calls on each person to take responsibility for their own life and for everything that happens in it.

Representatives:

Max Wertheimer (1880-1943), Wolfgang Köhler (1887-1967), Kurt Koffka (1886-1941)

Subject of study.

The doctrine of the integrity of mental phenomena.

Basic theoretical principles.

The concept of “insight” - (from English understanding, insight, sudden guess) is an intellectual phenomenon, the essence of which is an unexpected understanding of the problem at hand and finding its solution.

Practice.

The practice was based on one of two complex concepts of thinking - either associationist (learning to build on strengthening connections between elements), or formal - logical thinking. Both hinder the development of creative, productive thinking. Children who learn geometry at school using a formal method find it incomparably more difficult to develop a productive approach to problems than those who have not been taught at all.

Contribution.

Gestalt psychology believed that the whole is determined by the properties and functions of its parts. Gestalt psychology changed the previous view of consciousness, proving that its analysis is designed to deal not with individual elements, but with holistic mental images.

Gestalt psychology opposed associative psychology, which divides consciousness into elements.

Gestalt therapy by F. Perls.

A direction in psychotherapy developed within the framework of Gestalt psychological theory, author F. Perls. It is believed that a person, acting as an actor in interpersonal relationships, determines his own actions, consistent with the possibilities of self-actualization. The goal of Gestalt therapy is to achieve a “good figure” by the individual’s mental organization. To describe the psychotherapeutic process, concepts such as organism - environment, contact boundary, self-concept, cycle of experience, types of resistance (projection, introjection, retroflection, fusion) are used. Inhibited emotional reactions are responded to, thereby achieving the “completion of the gestalt.” All traumatic events are interpreted as alienated particles of the Self and are played out affectively.

Gestalt therapy by F. Perls. Basic theoretical principles

The central concept is the concept of the integrity of the organism and its interaction with the environment within a single field of activity. There is no fundamental difference between mental and physical activity. Mental activity is the activity of an entire organism, carried out at a lower energy level compared to physical activity. Any aspect of human behavior can be considered as a manifestation of the whole - his being. In therapy, what a person does—how he moves, how he speaks—gives as much information about him as what he says. The division of internal and external, like the division of mind and body, is rejected; external and internal forces that drive a person are inseparable from each other. There is a “contact boundary” between the individual and the environment, which determines the relationship between the person and the environment; contact is the formation of a gestalt, leaving is completion. The key to the rhythm of contact and care is the hierarchy of needs. The dominant need appears as a figure against the background of the entire integrity of the personality. Effective action is directed towards satisfying a dominant need. Neurosis is a distortion of the processes of contact and care, which disrupts the existence of a person as a single organism.

“Here and now.” The most important thing is how a person directly and in the present perceives himself and his environment. A neurotic person carries unfinished situations (incomplete gestalts) from the past. The Gestalt therapist helps the patient focus on the awareness of what he is experiencing here and now; the patient again plays out unfinished situations, experiences them in order to complete and assimilate these gestalts. Anxiety is a gap, a tension between “now” and “then.” People's inability to accept this tension forces them to plan, rehearse, and try to secure their future. Not only does this divert energy from the present (thus constantly creating unfinished situations), but it also destroys the openness to the future that is necessary for spontaneity and growth. Awareness of the present without running into the past or future leads to psychological growth. The experience of the present at any given moment is the only possible real experience, the condition for satisfaction and completeness from life, consists “in accepting this experience of the present with an open heart.”

“How” is more important than “why”. Structure and function are identical: if a person understands how he does something, he is able to understand the action itself. “Why” does not give a complete understanding: every action has many reasons, the explanation of all these reasons leads further and further from understanding the action itself. Each element in a person’s life is a fragment of one or more integral gestalts; the element cannot be understood as a “consequence” of some “cause” outside the holistic system of causes that are involved in it. The emphasis is on the person's ever-increasing awareness of his own behavior rather than on exploring why he behaves the way he does.

“Awareness.” The development process is the process of expanding zones of self-awareness; the main factor hindering this (psychological growth) is avoidance of awareness. As an exercise, it is suggested that you try to maintain a continuum of awareness: simply be aware, from second to second, of what experience you are currently experiencing. Usually this exercise is immediately interrupted when something unpleasant is recognized. As an avoidance of awareness, thoughts, expectations, memories, and associations of some experiences with others appear. These associative representations are not actually experienced; they flash, leaving the material unassimilated. The first unpleasant experience that interrupts the continuum remains unassimilated. This avoidance of continuous awareness, interruption of oneself, prevents a person from facing and processing unpleasant experiences. A person gets stuck in an unfinished situation. Be aware - pay attention to constantly emerging figures in your own perception. Avoid awareness - fixate any figure, interrupt the natural free flow of changing figures and background.

A person has three zones of awareness: awareness of himself, awareness of the world, awareness of what lies between one and the other - a kind of intermediate zones of fantasy. Perls considered the study of this intermediate zone (which interferes with the awareness of the first two) to be a great merit of Freud.

Psychological health and maturity is a transition from a state where the body relies on the environment and is regulated by the environment, to self-reliance and self-regulation. The therapeutic process, in particular, is aimed at achieving this transition, the most important element of which is the achievement of balance. One of the basic premises of Gestalt therapy is that every organism has the ability to achieve optimal internal balance, as well as balance between itself and the environment. The condition for this is awareness of the hierarchy of needs. A complete establishment of the hierarchy of needs can only be achieved through awareness that includes the entire organism, since the needs concern its various parts. Crucial is the ability to choose how a person relates to the environment, self-reliance and self-regulation - recognition of the ability to determine how a person supports and regulates himself in a field that includes many things other than people. A self-reliant person is able to choose the means to satisfy needs when they arise; he is aware of the boundaries between himself and others, and is especially attentive to distinguishing his fantasies from others (and about the environment in general) and from what is perceived in direct contact.

Paths of psychological development.

1. The first is the completion of unfinished situations - this is the level of clichés, the level of sign existence. Here the contact designations are: “Hello”, “Good morning”, “Beautiful weather, isn’t it”, etc.

2. The second is the level of roles or Bern games. This is the “as if” level, where people pretend to be who they would like to be.

3. By reorganizing these two levels, we reach the level of impasse (anti-existential) or the level of phobic avoidance. Here one experiences emptiness, nothingness. It is from here, avoiding this nothingness, that a person breaks off awareness and returns to the level of roles. If self-awareness is maintained, there is an internal explosion. This level—death, the fear of death—consists in the paralysis of opposing forces.

4. If you remain in touch, contact with this dying, the last level is reached - explosive, the level of external explosion. Awareness at this level constitutes the manifestation of the true personality, the true self of a person, capable of experiencing and expressing his emotions.

Explosions that a person experiences when emerging from the level of death:

· An explosion of grief containing processing of a loss or death that has not previously been assimilated;

· Explosion of orgasm in a sexually blocked person;

· An explosion of anger if anger was previously suppressed;

· An explosion of joy and laughter.

The main neurotic mechanisms are types of contact boundary violations.

1. Introjection – a person’s appropriation of standards, norms, methods, thinking, attitudes and methods of action that do not become his own and are not digested by him. One of the consequences is that a person loses the ability to distinguish between what he really feels and what others want him to feel or just others feel. I. The “dog on top and the dog on bottom” is decisive for the struggle, that is, the “dog on top” is a set of introjected rules and norms; until these norms are assimilated, their demands will be perceived as illegal and imposed from the outside.

2. Projection - a person’s tendency to shift onto others responsibility for what comes from himself - impulses, desires, behavior - the desire to place outside what belongs to a person. All dreams are projected fragments of the human psyche.

3. Merger - a person cannot accept the feeling of a boundary, cannot differentiate himself from others. The consequence is that a healthy rhythm of contact and care is impossible, and it is impossible to accept the differences between people.

4. Retroflection - “turning back on oneself” - energy is directed towards oneself (and not towards changing the environment and actions in it), a person divides himself into the subject and object of his own actions.

One aspect of contact and care is the relationship with other people. The feeling of belonging to a group is the primary psychological impulse for survival. Neuroses arise from rigidity in defining contact boundaries in relation to other people and the inability to find and maintain proper balance in relations with them.

The therapist is a projection screen on which the patient sees his missing capabilities; The goal of therapy is for the patient to regain these capabilities. The therapist is a skilled frustrator. While offering the patient satisfaction in the form of attention and acceptance, the therapist simultaneously frustrates him by refusing to give him the support that he internally lacks; The therapist helps the client move through his points of avoidance and dead ends. The first is to help the patient see how he constantly interrupts himself, avoids awareness, plays roles, etc. Group work is more effective than individual therapy. In a group, people can explore their situation, their relationships and their behavior towards each other. Supporting the group in “safe expression”, identifying with the conflicts of other group members and working through them can be very useful.

1. The present determines human behavior. The past acts through the needs and desires of the present. Gestalt is the result of the integration of factors operating at the moment. The most important part of the current experience becomes a figure: an emotion or need that is relevant at the moment. The body interacts with the environment in a contact-care rhythm. An urgent need creates contact with field particles endowed with cathexis. The formation of a gestalt is accompanied by awareness. A person carries out actions to satisfy a need, assimilates their result, completes the gestalt and leaves the field. This cycle then repeats with the formation of a new gestalt. If a person is aware of his needs at the moment, then a clear figure is built from them, on which the needs of the future and past are the background. Understanding your needs at the moment makes it possible for the most urgent of them to manifest itself and direct activity towards its satisfaction. On this path, an obstacle may arise in the form of denial or suppression of needs, and then the balance is disturbed and the gestalt is not complete and then the transition of the figure into the background stops => they constantly interfere with the understanding of the needs of the present, etc. self-regulation will be replaced by control and suppression of some needs and emotions. It also disrupts the contact between external and internal zones, which is necessary to satisfy needs.

2. The human body is a single whole. The main goal of Gestalt therapy is to find a comprehensive model rather than false dichotomies.

3. From 2 it follows that there is no difference between the self and the external world, but they constantly interact. The contact boundary - the boundary between the organism and the environment - is where psychological events occur. Contact is sensory awareness and committed action. Establishing contact with the environment. environment or its cancellation - is acceptance or non-acceptance. her.

4. Self - a system of contacts that took place at the border of contact. One of its manifestations is the formation of figures and backgrounds. It always combines feelings, motor movement and organic. needs. It consists of identifications and alienations that took place at the border of contact. Self-actualization can be seen as the expression of corresponding identifications and alienations. Normal functioning implies identification with the emerging organismic self of a person in the absence of suppression of his creative potential.

5. The main reason for the occurrence of neuroses is the collision of the body's needs with the environment. Their frustration leads to the suppression of desires, the destruction of contact, and the person begins to use only a safe, from his point of view, way of interacting with the world (contact - isolation - care).

6. The goal of Gestalt therapy is to change your lifestyle, take responsibility for your actions, thoughts, feelings; immerse yourself in being, in the current moment. Three principles of Gestalt therapy: I and You, what and how, here and now.

Contact boundary and protective mechanisms as a violation at the contact boundary

The contact boundary - the boundary between the organism and the environment - is where psychological events occur. Contact is sensory awareness and committed action. Establishing contact with the environment. environment or its cancellation - is acceptance or non-acceptance. her (here the gestalt is interrupted). A healthy personality is aware of the boundaries of the Self and the non-Self. If he recognizes it as bad, then he creates balance by losing boundaries or capturing the boundaries of another. A person is forced to study more when receiving an education than by focusing on his inherent biol. instincts. That. Many intuitive ideas about what are correctly blocked in people and are replaced by procedures, mainly focused on maintaining social. contacts. => this leads to disruption of contacts that arise on the basis of natural processes (“boys don’t cry”). Neurotics interrupt themselves. 4 mechanisms of neurosis: This can be seen in 4 types of neurotic mechanisms: 1. fusion - a way of avoiding contact. when the object does not become a clear figure and is not perceived separately; 2. introjection - borrowing someone else's experience without understanding what exactly this person needs (a metaphor for omnivorousness, in which “food” is not even chewed). At the same time, he behaves as others expect from him; 3. projection; 4. retroflexion occurs if an internal impulse, encountering an obstacle, changes direction. And then a person does for others what he expects from others.

Types of defense mechanisms and their interpretation in terms of Gestalt therapy

4 types of neurotic mechanisms: 1. fusion - a way of avoiding contact. when the object does not become a clear figure and is not perceived separately. At the same time, they demand similarity and refuse to tolerate differences; 2. introjection - borrowing someone else's experience without understanding what exactly this person needs (a metaphor for omnivorousness, in which “food” is not even chewed). At the same time, he behaves as others expect from him. This prevents individuals from coming into contact with their own reality because... they must fight alien complexes. These individuals are also incompatible with each other => personality disintegration; 3. projection - the tendency to consider as an element of the external world that which is actually part of the Self; 4. retroflexion occurs if an internal impulse, encountering an obstacle, changes direction. Here a person cannot draw a clear boundary between himself and others, while he treats himself the way he would initially like to be treated by others.

The existential principle of existence “here and now”; understanding psychopathology in terms of Gestalt therapy

In order to be able to form and complete a gestalt, a person must be fully aware of himself in the moment. To satisfy your needs, you need to constantly be in contact with the zones of your inner and outer world. There is also a middle zone (Maya) - fantasies, which also consists of beliefs, relationships, and thought processes. Neuroses arise from focusing on this zone, because... it comes into conflict when the other two zones are excluded from consciousness. When a person is in this zone, he is in the past or future. “There is nothing except what is here and now.” People who are “here-and-now” and have access to their feelings are unlikely to be anxious, because their excitement will be transformed into creative mind-controlled activity, resulting in the completion of the gestalt. Catastrophic (entail great precautions) and anastrophic fantasies (vv). Maintaining a balance between them is a way of perspective and rational daring. In psychosis, people are unable to contact reality and come into contact with Maya; with neurosis - the struggle between Maya and reality.

Purpose Gestalt therapy is changing your lifestyle, taking responsibility for your actions, thoughts, feelings; immerse yourself in being, in the current moment. Three principles of Gestaltherapy: I and You, what and how, here and now. Awareness does not mean intellectual comprehension, but a feeling in which a person is immersed in the processes of internal and external reality, and not reasoning. The work is not so much with the content of the problem, but with the methods that prevent the establishment of contact. The goal is to achieve awareness. The process of self-actualization implies an effective balance of contact and withdrawal and the ability to use energy to satisfy real, rather than fictitious needs. In addition, self-actualization presupposes the ability to resist frustration until a solution appears. Independent people take responsibility for their existence and have freedom of choice.

A direction in psychology that arose in Germany in the early 10s and existed until the mid-30s. XX century The development of the problem of integrity posed by the Austrian school was continued. The study of brain activity and phenomenological introspection, focused on different contents of consciousness, can be considered as complementary methods that study the same thing, but use different conceptual languages.

By analogy with electromagnetic fields in physics, consciousness in Gestalt psychology was understood as a dynamic whole, a “field” in which each point interacts with all the others. For the experimental study of this field, a unit of analysis was introduced, which began to act as a gestalt. Gestalts were discovered in the perception of shape, apparent movement, and optical-geometric illusions.

The law of pregnancy was discovered: the desire of the psychological field to form the most stable, simple and “economical” configuration. Factors that contribute to the grouping of elements into integral gestalts: “proximity factor”, “similarity factor”, “good continuation factor”, “common fate factor”. In the field of psychology of thinking, Gestalt psychologists have developed a method for experimental research of thinking - the “reasoning out loud” method.

Representatives:

? Max Wertheimer (1880-1943)
? Wolfgang Köhler (1887-1967)
? Kurt Koffka (1886-1941)

Subject matter

The doctrine of the integrity of mental phenomena. Patterns of gestalts and insights.

Theoretical provisions

Practice

The practice was based on one of two complex concepts of thinking - either associationist (learning to build on strengthening connections between elements) , or formal - logical thinking. Both hinder the development of creative, productive thinking. Children who study geometry at school on the basis of a formal method find it incomparably more difficult to develop a productive approach to problems than those who have not studied at all.

Contributions to psychology

Introduction

Gestalt psychology -- holistic form, structure) developed as a result of a protest against behaviorism and pre-existing psychological trends. If we manage to understand the essence of Gestalt psychology, then we will get closer to understanding cognitive psychology, so let’s take a step forward and try to figure out what this direction is and what it led to.

As we already know, behaviorists put behavior at the forefront, but according to Gestalt psychology, behavior is something more than a bunch of reflexes. It is holistic and, therefore, the holistic approach to the psyche was contrasted by Gestalt psychologists with the fragmentation of all other directions.

Originating simultaneously with behaviorism, Gestalt psychology was initially engaged in the study of sensations, but the figurative aspect of mental life, despite all efforts, slipped out of hand, and this happened because there was no theory that could somehow explain the experimental data obtained. Gestalt psychology was formed during the dominance of idealistic philosophy, which naturally affected its orientation.

The meaning of Gestalt

The word Gestalt means “form”, “structure”, “holistic configuration”, i.e. an organized whole whose properties cannot be obtained from the properties of its parts. At this time, special attention was paid to the problem of the whole and the part. Many scientists came to the understanding that the quality of a holistic education was not reduced to the sum of the individual elements included in the whole, and that it could not be deduced from them. But it is the whole that determines the qualitative characteristics of the elements, therefore Gestalt psychologists believe that the experience is holistic and cannot simply be divided into its component parts.

How it all began

I think the German idealist philosopher F. Brentano can be considered one of the “foundation stones” of the school of Gestalt psychology. He developed the doctrine of the objectivity of consciousness as a generic feature of mental phenomena, and became the founder of a whole galaxy of future founders of Gestalt. His student K. Stumpf was an adherent of phenomenology and anticipated the basic ideas of Gestalt psychology, and G. Müller, who studied experimental psychology, psychophysics and memory.

They, in turn, had a student E. Husserl, from the University of Göttingen, who is the author of the idea according to which logic should be turned into phenomenology, the purpose of which is to reveal fundamental phenomena and ideal laws of knowledge, and phenomenology should abstract from everything related to human existence, and study "pure" essences. For this, the introspective (from the Latin introspecto - looking inside, introspection) method was not suitable, the need arose to transform it, and as a result the phenomenological method appeared.

On this basis, the school of Gestalt psychology arose, whose representatives were M. Wertheimer, W. Keller and K. Koffka, who founded the journal “Psychological Research” in 1921, D. Katz and E. Rubin and many other scientists.

Gestalt psychologists have conducted many studies and works in the field of perception and memory. W. Keller’s student G. von Restorff conducted a series of experiments and derived the dependence of memorization success on the structure of the material.

In the pre-war years of the last century, the school of Gestalt psychology collapsed due to the inability to develop a unified scheme for the analysis of mental reality. But the ideas of Gestalt psychologists are still influential, although not as popular in modern psychology.

Ideas and developments of Gestalt psychology

From the works of one of the representatives of Gestalt psychology, D. Katz, “Constructing the World of Colors” and “Constructing the World of Conscious Perceptions,” it is clear that visual and tactile experience is much more complete than its depiction in psychological schemes limited to simple concepts, i.e. the image must be studied as an independent phenomenon, and not as an effect of a stimulus.

The main property of an image is its constancy under changing conditions of perception. The sensory image remains constant when conditions change, but constancy is destroyed if the object is perceived not in a complete visual field, but in isolation from it. mental personality sensitivity

Perspective restructuring

Danish psychologist E. Rubin studied the phenomenon of “figure and ground,” which speaks of the integrity of perception and the fallacy of the idea of it as a mosaic of sensations. So, for example, in a flat drawing the figure is perceived as a closed, protruding whole, separated from the background by a contour, while the background seems to be behind.

“Dual images” are perceived differently, where the drawing appears to be either a vase or two profiles. This phenomenon was called perceptive restructuring, i.e. restructuring of perception. According to Gestalt theory, we perceive an object as a coherent whole. Let's say the subject describes his perception of some phenomenon, and psychologists are already developing Gestalt principles, namely: the principles of similarity, proximity, optimal continuation and closure. Figure and ground, constancy, are, in fact, the main phenomena in the field of sensory knowledge. Gestaltists discovered phenomena in experiments, but they also had to be explained.

Phi phenomenon

The school of Gestalt psychology began its lineage from Wertheimer's main experiment, the so-called phi phenomenon. With the help of special instruments (strobe and tachiostoscope), he exposed two stimuli (two straight lines) one after another at different speeds. With a sufficiently large interval, the subject perceived them sequentially. At a very short interval, the lines were perceived simultaneously, and at the optimal interval (about 60 milliseconds) a perception of motion occurred, that is, the eye saw a line moving to the right or left, rather than two lines given sequentially or simultaneously. When the time interval exceeded the optimal one, the subject began to perceive pure movement, that is, to realize that movement was occurring, but without moving the line itself. This was the so-called phi phenomenon. Many similar experiments were carried out and the phi phenomenon always appeared, not as a combination of individual sensory elements, but as a “dynamic whole”. This also refuted the existing concept of combining sensations into a coherent picture.

Physical Gestalts and Insight

Keller's work "Physical Gestalts at rest and in a stationary state" explained the psychological method according to the physical-mathematical type. He believed that the mediator between the physical field and holistic perception should be a new physiology of integral and dynamic structures - gestalts. Keller presented the imagined physiology of the brain in physico-chemical form.

Gestalt psychologists believed that the principle of isomorphism (elements and relationships in one system correspond one-to-one to elements and relationships in another) would help solve the psychophysical problem, while preserving consciousness’s independence and correspondence to material structures.

Isomorphism did not solve the main questions of psychology and followed the idealistic tradition. They presented mental and physical phenomena according to the type of parallelism rather than causal connection. Gestaltists believed that, based on the special laws of Gestalt, psychology would turn into an exact science like physics.

Keller, interpreting intelligence as behavior, conducted his famous experiments on chimpanzees. He created situations in which the monkey had to find workarounds to achieve the goal. The point was in how she solved the problem, whether it was a blind search for a solution through trial and error, or the monkey achieved the goal thanks to a sudden “insight”, understanding of the situation.

Keller spoke in favor of the second explanation; this phenomenon was called insight (insight - grasping, understanding), which makes it possible to emphasize the creative nature of thinking. Indeed, this hypothesis revealed the limitations of the trial and error method, but pointing to insight did not explain the mechanism of intelligence in any way.

A new experimental practice has emerged for studying sensory images in their integrity and dynamics (K. Duncker, N. Mayer).

The meaning of Gestalt psychology

What is the reason that Gestaltism has ceased to meet new scientific needs? Most likely, the main reason is that mental and physical phenomena in Gestalt psychology were considered on the principle of parallelism, without a causal relationship. Gestaltism claimed to be a general theory of psychology, but in fact its achievements concerned the study of one of the aspects of the psyche, which was indicated by the category of image. When explaining phenomena that could not be represented in the category of image, enormous difficulties arose.

Gestalt psychology should not have separated image and action; the image of the Gestaltists acted as an entity of a special kind, subject to its own laws. A methodology based on the phenomenological concept of consciousness has become an obstacle to a truly scientific synthesis of these two categories.

Gestaltists questioned the principle of association in psychology, but their mistake was that they separated analysis and synthesis, i.e. separated the simple from the complex. Some Gestalt psychologists even denied sensation as a phenomenon altogether.

But Gestalt psychology drew attention to issues of perception, memory and productive, creative thinking, the study of which is the main task of psychology.

And what about the grown-up baby, safely forgotten by us? What happened to him while we were trying to understand such complex intricacies of Gestalt psychology? At first he learned to distinguish between images and express his feelings, to receive pleasant and unpleasant sensations. He grew and developed, now in line with Gestalt psychology.

He remembered images faster and better not as a result of associations, but as a result of his still small mental abilities, “insights,” i.e. insight. But while he was still far from perfect, a lot of time would pass before he learned creative thinking. Everything takes time and a conscious need.

Historical connections between the discoveries of Gestalt and physiology

The creation of stimuli that directly and convincingly confirmed the principles of Gestalt enabled the school's followers to believe that the focus of the study of perceptual processes should be qualitative data, rather than more traditional quantitative analysis. This approach placed Gestalt psychology outside the mainstream of psychological research. Gestalt psychologists examined how perceptual principles (such as the principle of good continuation) fit with what was known at the time about brain physiology. It was believed that each line in the drawing “The Principle of Good Continuation” addresses a separate part of the brain, tuned precisely to its corresponding angle of inclination; and a coherent pattern is extracted from disparate lines because the number of similarly oriented segments that form a long line inclined at 45 degrees is greater and therefore they cause a strong cortical response that allows the brain to group segments with the same slope into a meaningful unit.

Gestalt psychologists argued that the principles of the organization of perception reflected the physiological organization of the brain, and not the processes of the mind, as Kant assumed. Köhler described this idea, called psychophysical isomorphism, as the correspondence of the distribution of the basic processes of the brain to the organization of space, which has a functional order. He believed that the brain contains functional equivalences, not pictures of the external world. Gestalt psychology differs in this way from structuralism, which believes that the brain is mechanistically organized to extract elements of conscious experience. Gestalt theorists hypothesized that sensory stimuli appeal to structured electrochemical fields in the brain, changing them and being changed by them. Our perception is the result of such interaction. The key point is that brain activity actively changes sensations and gives them characteristics that they would not otherwise have. Therefore, the whole (electrochemical force fields of the brain) is primary in relation to the parts (sensations), and it is the whole that gives meaning to the parts.

Gestalt principles and perception research

By the 1920s, Gestalt psychology was being actively promoted through the journal Psychologische Forschung ("Psychological Research"). But the Nazis' rise to power in 1933 divided the group before the creation of a doctoral program. Emigration to the United States scattered participants across different universities, which did not allow the creation of a unified program. However, the power of their ideas and the compelling simplicity of the stimuli led other scientists studying perception to include Gestalt theories in their studies. The development of computer recognition has forced us to return to the Gestalt principles of grouping to obtain algorithms for coordinating disparate sets of stimuli, as, for example, happens in top-down processing. Thus, the Gestalt approach to perception was given a new impetus through the development of new principles and the incorporation of existing ones into modern perceptual models.