Tuesday, April 28, 2020

Chapter 10 The Gestaltists

Chapter 10 Gestaltists

Chapter 10 highlights the work of three distinguished Gestalt psychology: Wertheimer, Koffka, Kohler. The three men met by chance of Wertheimer's research on illusion and mental processing theory. The three men formulated a partnership to discover the role illusion plays in mental processing. Each man brought their own level of expertise to the experiments they conducted to see if their theory worked. After their stint of working together, Wertheimer went on to be a lecturer and later a Professor Extraordinarius at the University of Berlin. Koffka also became a Professor Extraordinarius in Giessen, lead lecturers, and later took a position in America at the Smith College. Unlike the other two, Kohler was a true success out of the three in Germany. After a decade of dedicated work, he earned a position as head of the Psychological Institue at the University of Berlin. However, before the men went their separate ways they were able to establish their theory on mentalism. Kohler then began conducting research with the chimpanzee's mentality. is the study included putting bananas out of the reach of the chimpanzees with a stick one time and two boxes of different sizes another time. While watching them he discovered that the chimpanzee was able to get the banana with the stick after some effort. Then the chimpanzee was able to figure out after some time time to put one box on top of the other would help him reach the bananas. It was determined that Kohler's research was not like Thorndike's cat experiments where they worked to gain a reward. In Kohler's experiment, the chimpanzees solved the problem before they could get to the reward. 

Purpose - the author's purpose for writing this chapter is to highlight the legitimacy of Gestalt psychology is a profound part of psychology. This is seen through the exceptional works of Wertheimer, Koffka, Kohler. 
Information - the author uses the upbringing, educational background, and scientific works of each man to show the progression of their field of study, 
Concepts - the key concepts the author uses is the academic achievements of the three men and others in the chapter. The author also highlights the research and studies they conduct to give support and legitimacy of Gestalt psychology. 

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