Gestalt Psychology
•	Precursors
•	Basic principles
•	Major figures
Precursors
•	Brentano
•	Külpe
•	Mach
•	Stumpf
•	Von Ehrenfels
Franz Brentano (1838-1917)
•	Degree in philosophy and a priest
•	Aristotle influence – activity of mind
•	Students
•	Stumpf
•	Freud
•	Husserl
•	Meinong (Heider)
•	Von Ehrenfels
Bentano’s Act School
•	Experimentation
•	Viewed with suspicion because it breaks up mental integrity
•	Need few subjects if real science
•	Radical distinction between mental content and acts
•	Against British (and Wundtian) tradition of identifying mind with ideas or content
•	Mental is process of thinking
•	Important parts of mental life governed by intention and conscious attention
Bentano’s influence
•	Philosophical phenomenology
•	Husserl
•	Heidegger
•	Existentialists
•	Sociology
•	Weber
•	Schemer
•	Psychology
•	Gestalt
•	James Ward
•	William McDougall
Oswald Külpe (1862-1915)
•	Student of Wundt
•	Dissatisfied with narrowness of Wundt
•	Würzburg 
•	Not all aspects of sensation present in consciousness
•	Imageless thought
•	Aufgabe or cognitive set
•	Influences
•	Alternative to Wundt
•	Paved way for cognitive psychology
Ernst Mach (1838-1916)
•	Trained in physics and mathematics
•	Important philosopher of science
•	All science rests on observation
•	So psychology of perception is crucial
•	Time and space
•	Previously seen as categories and vessels of experience
•	Important in own right as objects of experience
•	Influences on Gestalt
•	Phenomenology is crucial – data of experience
•	Extension and duration are crucial data 
Carl Stumpf (1848-1936)
•	Early influences
•	Brentano 
•	Loetze
•	Weber-Fechner
•	Chair at Berlin
Stumpf’s influence
•	Disagreements with Wundt
•	Time perception
•	Music perception – Gestalts
•	Students
•	Koffka
•	Köhler
•	Lewin
Christian von Ehrenfels (1859-1932)
•	Student of Brentano and Meinong
•	Perceptual qualities organized
•	In time and space
•	Gestaltqualitat (form qualities)
•	Real opponent was Wundt
Gestalt Psychology Opposed Wundt
•	Opposition to analysis and reductionism
•	Relationship of brain to experience
•	Mental not always isomorphic with stimuli
•	Wundt & Helmholtz 
•	Brain accurately records
•	Error comes from past experience, etc.
•	Gestalt
•	Recent physics of field theory crucial
•	Brain organizes sensations
•	And mental content isomorphic with brain
The Phi Phenomenon
•	Two bars with 60 msec difference creates apparent motion
•	Previous explanation in terms of unconscious inferences and implicit eye movements
•	Gestalt explanation
•	Wertheimer argues eye cannot move this fast
•	Antagonistic movement with 3 bars
•	Has to be a brain reorganization
Gestalt Psychology Basic Principles
•	Focus on perception rather than learning
•	Phenomenological approach
•	Disliked learning emphasis on atomism and associationism
•	Learning became a matter of perceptual reorganization
•	Various laws of perception and perceptual illusions
•	Creativity and productive thinking
•	Brain is important but not a switchboard
•	The single subject and compelling demonstration
The Major Founders
•	Max Wertheimer
•	Wolfgang Köhler
•	Kurt Koffka
Max Wertheimer (1880-1943)
•	Studied law in Prague
•	Studied with Stumpf at Berlin but degree with Külpe
•	Main work in Frankfurt where Köhler and Koffka worked with him
•	US New School
•	Creativity and productive thinking
•	Never comfortable with English
Kurt Koffka (1886-1941)
•	Degree with Stumpf at Berlin
•	Then Frankfurt and Geissen
•	Smith College in 1927
•	Tended to be interested in developmental issues
Wolfgang Köhler (1887-1958)
•	Degree with Stumpf at Berlin
•	Tone perception research
•	Ape studies in WWI
•	Stumpf’s successor at Berlin in 1922
•	Became Rector
•	Resigned as protest to Hitler and Jewish exclusion
•	US at Swarthmore then Dartmouth
•	Comfortable with English
•	Popularizer
•	But also most knowledgeable about physics
•	Spokesman
Importance of Gestalt Psychology
•	Made perception the center of psychology
•	Major forerunner of modern cognitive psychology
•	Led to major research debates
•	Most lost by Gestaltists
•	In part because of inferior experimental skills
Importance of gestalt Psychology for Social Psychology
•	Kurt Lewin
•	Field theory
•	Motivational components
•	Life space
•	Contemporary forces
•	Resolution of competing forces
•	Festinger’s cognitive dissonance theory
•	Fritz Heider’s balance theory and attribution