Gestalt << guh SHTAHLT >> psychology is a school of psychology that emphasizes the study of experience as a unified whole. Gestalt psychologists believe that pattern, or form, is the most important part of experience. The whole pattern gives meaning to each individual element of experience. In other words, the whole is more important than the sum of its parts. Gestalt is a German word that means pattern, form, or shape.
Gestalt psychology flourished between 1910 and 1945. Experiments performed by German psychologists Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, Wolfgang Kohler, and others helped spread Gestalt ideas throughout Europe and the United States. These ideas were a revolt against structuralism, the most common psychological view between about 1880 and 1910. Structural psychologists believed the best way to study experience was to analyze its separate elements, such as feelings, images, and sensations. The Gestalt viewpoint also differed from behaviorism, by calling for the study of human experience rather than behavior.
Psychologists used Gestalt ideas in developing several principles. For example, the principle of closure states that people tend to see incomplete patterns as complete or unified wholes. According to this principle, a fragmented circle is often perceived as a complete circle. The principle of figure-ground perception states that people tend to regard any kind of pattern as a figure against a background. Examples include pictures on a wall and words on a page. Gestalt psychology is no longer regarded as a separate school, but its ideas continue to influence psychologists, including those who study perception and human experience.
See also Kohler, Wolfgang; Psychology (Gestalt psychology); Psychotherapy.
