Topical Blog Week #10 (Due Wednesday)

What we would like you to do is to find a topic from this week's chapter that you were interested in and search the internet for material on that topic.
Please be sure to use at least 3 quality resources. If you use videos, please limit it to one video.
Once you have completed your search and explorations we would like you to:
1a) State what your topic is. Wolfgang Kohler
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter. He was an important Gestalt psychologists.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it. I liked the information about his work with apes, as a German spy during WWI and his disdain for Hitler in WWII.
2) Next, we would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about the topic in a knowledgeable manner. By integrating/synthesizing we mean taking what your read/experienced from the internet search organize the information into the main themes, issues, info, examples, etc. about your topic and then write about the topic in your own words using the information you have about the topic.
Wolfgang Kohler was born January 22, 1887 in the Governorate of Estonia in the Russian Empire. He was German in origin, and when he was six he and his family moved back to Germany, and settled down in Wolfenbuttell. He received his PhD from the University of Berlin in 1909. After he graduated, he worked at theS psychological institute in Frankfort-am-Main. Here he met other gestalt psychologists, Wertheimer and Koffka.
One of the subjects he studied was problem solving. He traveled to the Canary Islands where he studied apes for six years. It was here he wrote his book on problem solving called The Mentality of Apes. Kohler believed that animals, and humans, gain knowledge through insight rather than trial-and-error. He witnesses this when he saw apes try to get to bananas that were out of reach. Once the bananas were over their heads and out of arms reach, so the grabbed a crate and climbed on top of it to get the bananas. Another time they placed the bananas outside of the cage. The apes grabbed a stick a used it to extend their arm in order to get the bananas.
Another interesting thing about Kohler is that he was rumored to be a spy for Germany during WWI. While he was studying the apes on Canary Island, WWI broke out and he was forced to stay on the island. This is where the rumors began that someone was supplying the Germans with information about British locations of ship movements. Some believed that Kohler could have been that spy, and that his ape research was merely a façade. It was also said that he had a powerful radio in his attic that could have been powerful enough to send these messages. However, there has been skepticism about this involvement, as he did put out a lot of research and writing while on the island, and that he most likely would not have enough time to also spy. However, as he was very patriotic during this time, if he did happen across information it wouldn’t be surprising if he passed this information on.
During Hitler’s reign during the 1930s and 1940s, Kohler spoke out against Hitler and his stance on Jewish academia in 1933. He even wrote an article named “Gesprache in Deutschland” translating to “Conversations in Germany” which spoke out against Hitler and his regime. This was the last published article that spoke out against Hitler in this time period in Germany. Luckily for Kohler, the Nazis did not come after him. Instead, Kohler received many letters from Jews and non-Jews commending him and expressing their gratitude. He hoped he could also get some of his colleagues to help join his fight against the Nazis, but none did. At the end of 1933, the Nazi government ordered all classes open with the Nazi salute. After he was refused to pledge a loyalty oath to Hitler, he resigned from her professorship at the college, and immigrated to the United States in 1935. He became the president of the APA in 1959.
3) At the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites.For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_K%C3%B6hler I used this website primarily for learning about his research.
http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/bioscopes_wolfgangkohler.html I used this website mainly for the information about his possible espionage.
http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/kohler.htm - This website gave more information on his biography than the other websites.

1a) State what your topic is.
Carl Stumpf
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
Carl Stumpf was discussed briefly in the chapter about being one of the first Gestalt psychologists who also trained many of the leading men who came after him in the field.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I was first interested in Stumpf when reading his section and it said he was a very talented musician who could play six different instruments. I was also curious to find out more about how he became interested in Gestalt psychology and his work in the field.
2) Carl Stumpf was born April 21, 1848 and died Christmas day 1939, he was a German psychologist and philosopher who made his impact on phenomenology, the study of the structures of subjective experience and consciousness. As I also pointed out above, Stumpf was also an extremely talented musician who could play six different instruments. This helped him in his work on the auditory perception of tones. One of Stumpf’s books, Psychology of Sound, was published in two volumes and dealt with the perception of sounds, specifically with judgments caused by sounds. Stumpf established several important concepts such as analysis, attention, relations, and the well-known concept of fusion, which is the basis of his theory of music. Stumpf considered himself to be a psychologist, but he studied phenomena like tones, colors and images. Then in 1894, Stumpf was offered one of the most respected positions in German psychology at the University of Berlin. He soon became the director of the Berlin Psychological Institute. At the University, Stumpf had an important influence on Max Wertheimer, Wolfgang Kohler and Kurt Koffka, co-founders of Gestalt psychology. Wertheimer and Koffka would also receive their PhD from Stumpf at Berlin. While Stumpf was very well known in the world of psychology he is also known for being one of the main challengers of Wundt. Unlike Wundt, Stumpf urged the primacy of direct experience over abstract reductionism, because he was such a talented musician he believed skilled musicians were better observers in judging musical tones. Stumpf gave a lot to the field of psychology but also taught many of the leading men that came after him.

3) http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/stumpf.html
This site was helpful in discussing the rivalry between Wundt and Stumpf and detailing what exactly they disagreed upon.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/stumpf/
This site was helpful in discussing Stumpf and his relationship with the co-founders of Gestalt psychology Wertheimer, Koffka and Kohler.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Stumpf
This website was helpful in giving a much more broad background of Carl Stumpf and his life as well as his research and work with tone and images.

Once you have completed your search and explorations we would like you to:
1a) State what your topic is.
Tensions systems
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
In the chapter Lewin’s concepts of topology and the tension system was discussed. It shows how one reaches a goal and the tension describes the difficulties getting to the goals.

1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I think that the tension concept and system is interesting. I also compare it to the ecosystem theory that we use in social work. This combines 3 different levels and the interactions between them, but the tension topology is similar to the smallest part of the eco system or the micro system. I just found it interesting that they were in some ways very similar.
2) Next, we would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about the topic in a knowledgeable manner. By integrating/synthesizing we mean taking what your read/experienced from the internet search organize the information into the main themes, issues, info, examples, etc. about your topic and then write about the topic in your own words using the information you have about the topic.
One of the most interesting things I learned while researching this topic was how the tension topology is integrated into Gestalt therapy. I just got done learning more about Gestalt therapy and I guess the tensions are based on the needs of the person, people are said to be in the state on tension when a need occurs. When the person thinks what is happening will reduce the tension then that is a positive valence, but if the think it will increase tension then that is a negative valence. A vector helps move along the tension process, so when it’s in a negative valence it pushes it through that towards the positive valence and when in the positive valence a vector pushes it towards its goal.
With the tension we seem to learn a lot and that’s where growth in a person occurs. With conflict one learns and grows from the way situations are handled. If the tension was relaxed, but ended badly then they learn to hopefully not be in the same situation, however if it turned out for the better that handling a similar situation in the same way should hopefully produce similar results that also have positive results. We are constantly in a state of tension. There is always something we need to do or some goal we need to work on, it may not be something negative, but no matter what it is always there.
Some tensions systems however never seem to go away, or they reappear. In Gestalt therapy they would call that unfinished business, there is some form of tension that just never goes away and is always there that the person has yet to make any progress with. So in therapy they try to deal with the unfinished business and help each client to move forward and not have any issues from the past keep them from pursuing goals in their future.
I think the tension system gives a great visual to the needs and goals in our life that do cause tension because we need to get them done in order to be a fully present individual. I think it could be a great tool for therapy as well and I’m glad to hear that they have already brought this concept into the Gestalt therapy.

http://www.sonoma.edu/users/d/daniels/lewinnotes.html
this website gave a good overview of the tensions system and what it does and shows.

http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/Lewin.html
this site gave a lot of information about lewin and about field theory and the basics of the tensions system

http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/mkyang/O/psyc/lewin.html
this website gave more information on the tensions system and how it was incorporated into therapy

1. The topic that I chose to research more on was about behavioral versus geographic environment. I chose this topic because I did not fully understand what the difference was, I know that you can perceive things in different ways, but I would like to know if multiple people perceive something one way if it is considered behavioral still or geographic. I want to know where that line is and how fine it is, is it flexible due to certain circumstances? This relates to the chapter because there is a section on behavioral and geographical environment, I got good information from that section but I am still confused what defines one over the other.
2. In the first article I read it was talking about behavioral and perception within environments. It was stating that the two terms are linked when it comes to the environment. For example different people may act different in the same environment as others, this was said that it is because they perceive the environment differently. This makes sense to me because there are many things that can contribute to a certain person acting differently in an environment, and perception can be based upon what their interests and what they are looking for in certain environments. For example take the forest, two people can view it through its geography features and state that it is just a forest. Although they both state it as a forest, if one is big into hunting and the other does not hunt, their behavior in the environment can be different even though the geographical features are the same. The hunter may be looking for certain animals as if he were hunting, the other may be exploring the trees and smaller critters because it is not an environment that he is well known to.
In the second article that I read, the main point of the article was to describe what behavioral environment was and how it linked to humans. It said that in behavioral environment, geography is used to understand the human reactions in the certain area. For example, in a cave instead of studying the features of the cave, the scientist would be studying interactions in the cave and how people react differently inside it. I know that when I was in a cave I felt different walking through it, it was so compact. Aside to what I observed in the cave, the feeling of the cave gave me a claustrophobic feel because it seemed that everything was closer and the amount of people made the space feel jammed creating that feel. I also may have been on edge due to the amount of cliffs that were seen, the geographical feature made me feel uncomfortable because of the fear that I would slip or fall. After reading this article I can almost see how the two can play hand in hand and both relate to each other no matter what environment.
In the third article, the main point was to describe what geographical environment was defined as and how it related to humans and their interactions with it. This is the actual environment and how it is perceived without thinking of how humans behave in it. Another way that this is linked to humans is that humans can alter any geographic environment and make it into a whole new type of environment. An example of this would be man-made lakes, and the building of communities. Of course the building of communities are going to have people altering the geographical environment by more people using the space and more instances where littering can take place and more chances that the land can be altered. Although human communities can alter the land, the land had to be altered first to build a community. Trees have to be cut down, houses need to be built and land is also used for agriculture. Doing this research I have found out that the two relate to each other more than they are different. Humans behave in certain ways depending on what type of geographical environment they are in and the geographical environment can be altered to meet behavioral needs and wants. They are two separate definitions and are studied in two different way, although they may seem different they are more similar than they originally appear.
3. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.14678306.1979.tb01268.x#.Um_uL_mshsI
This is a good article, it is summing up a book called Behavioral and Perception Geography: A Critical Appraisal. Even though it is just a summery, it gives a good definition of perception of environment and how it links to Behavioral activity.
http://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199874002/obo-9780199874002-0069.xml
This article is about behavioral environment and how it is linked to all humans. I think this was a useful article because to fully understand the differences between the two different environments, you need to understand what they both are in more detail.

http://gpe.concordia.ca/undergraduate-programs/bsc_eg/

I chose this article because it went into what is geographic environment and how it also is linked to humans and what connection is there between the two. Again to understand the difference between geographic environment and behavioral environment, both of them must be understood in more detail.

1a-c) I did my topical blog on Hedwig von Restorff and her contributions to the world of psychology. She came up with what is now known as the Von Restorff effect or the isolation effect. The Von Restorff effect relates to the chapter because it is introduced in with gestalt research done on cognition and the way we think about things.

The reason that I am interested in this topic is simply because Hedwig von Restorff is practically the only female that is introduced in this chapter and I believe it is important to acknowledge the females that were involved with gestalt psychology as well as the males; females do not get as much credit as they should in any subject, so why not highlight what she created and was a part of.

2) Hedwig von Restorff created an idea that would change the way we learn and give new light on the research on cognition. She created what is called the Von Restorff Effect or the isolation effect. This effect is supposed to help people learn or recall a set of words or even just a single word by using the concept of isolation. By putting one word in a white font in front of a plain piece of black construction paper the word is more likely to pop out and the person is going to remember seeing that more likely than seeing a word mixed in with a bunch of different colors. This is an example of the isolation effect a.k.a the Von Restorff effect. Another example would be Dr. Seuss books or even different ads for a product. This helps the person who saw the commercial or book remember what it looked like or even simply help them remember the product.

Every website that I came across stated that in 1933 she came up with an experiment that tested this notion that someone could remember a word or two if it popped out of a background and seemed more appealing to the eyes. With her findings she came across the idea that it was true, someone could identify the word or words if it was a bright plain color in front of bland plain color. In the book she discovered that if she listed a bunch of random letters and then had a random 3 digit number placed in the middle of the letters the person would be able to pick out the 3 digit number faster than they would the 3 digit series in a list with a bunch of other 3 digit numbers. This was a fascinating finding that she had found that created a new way of leaning.

Also mixed in with this idea the idea of the serial position effect that was introduced by Hermann Ebbinghaus was a part of this whole ordeal. This idea claimed that we as humans can recall more information that is held at either the beginning of a list or at the end of the list simply due to the position that it is in. So for some reason this was included in with the idea that Hedwig von Restorff created, which does make sense.

3) http://www.psychologyconcepts.com/von-restorff-effect-or-isolation-effect-or-novelty-effect/

I used this website just because it gave me a better understanding and gave me a visual of what the Von Restorff Effect actually did and was about.

http://humanmemory2007.wikispaces.com/Von+Restorff+Effect

This website gave me just a little bit of information but information that was useful when trying to write my summary about the effect. It also brought a little bit of information about Ebbinghaus in the mix.

http://humanmemory2007.wikispaces.com/Serial+Position+Effect

This website had more information about the idea that Hermann Ebbinghaus introduced a long with Hedwig von Restorffs idea of if the isolation effect. It gave me a bigger heads up about what he had actually done to help her research and help further her idea.

Topical Blog: Gestalt Psychology

I decided to research gestalt psychology because I found it extremely interesting when I was reading the textbook and I decided that I wanted to know more about it.Gestalt is a German word meaning form or configuration. The Gestalt school of thought evolved from the research done by Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, and Wolfgang Kohler. The school of thought looks at the human mind and behavior as a whole.

“The fundamental formula of Gestalt theory might be expressed in this way. There are wholes, the behavior of which is not determined by that of their individual elements, but where the part-processes are themselves determined by the intrinsic nature of the whole. It is the hope of Gestalt theory to determine the nature of such wholes.”
– Max Wertheimer 1924

Have you ever noticed how a series of flashing lights often appears to be moving, such as neon signs or strands of Christmas lights? According to Gestalt psychology, this apparent movement happens because our minds fill in missing information. This belief that the whole is greater than the sum of the individual parts led to the discovery of several different phenomena that occur during perception. This is known as the Phi-Phenomenon and it was discovered by Max Wertheimer.

His experiment consisted of sitting in a dark room watching two balls of light flashing on and off alternatively. If the timing between the two flashes was more than .2 seconds the light was seen two different lights. If it was faster than .2 seconds the light was seen as one moving light. This motion is like the motion pictures we seen of T.V. For example, Walt Disney’s moving pictures or any other cartoon show.

Major elaborations of the new formulation occurred within the next decades. Wertheimer, Köhler, Koffka, and their students extended the Gestalt approach to problems in other areas of perception, problem solving, learning, and thinking. The Gestalt principles were later applied to motivation, social psychology, and personality and to aesthetics and economic behavior. Wertheimer demonstrated that Gestalt concepts could also be used to shed light on problems in ethics, political behavior, and the nature of truth. Gestalt psychology’s traditions continued in the perceptual investigations undertaken by Rudolf Arnheim and Hans Wallach in the United States.

http://psychology.about.com/od/schoolsofthought/f/gestalt_faq.htm
I picked this link because I always enjoy using the about.com site. I feel like it has good information and it explains it in a way that I understand best.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/232098/Gestalt-psychology/
I picked this webpage because it is the online encyclopedia and I think that would be a really good source to use. Plus, I know the information I am reading is accurate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x77Ac4_NRbQ
I picked this video because I like watching videos; I think I learn better that way. I also picked it because it good information and it seemed more like a professional video.

I decided to research more into the work of Carl Stumpf. Carl Stumpf was discussed in this chapter because he disagreed with Wundt's pure introspection. A lot of his work was based on his experimentation with music and how the experience of perception a subject may report may not be accurate. I enjoyed reading about how two different tones can sound like one tone, so I decided to look more into it.

Carl Stumpf was born in Bavaria to a very successful family. Stumpf had a great interest in music and started composing his own music at age ten. He mastered six different instruments and later combined this talent with his study of science and philosophy during his college years. After earning his degree, he took a job as a professor at the University of Wurzburg in 1873. There he decided to begin research into sound and perception, describing what has become known as tonal fusion. Tonal fusion is when two different tones played at the same time sound like a single tone to the human ear. This most often occurred when tones were in unison, at octaves, or when the second note was played at the perfect fifth. This contributed to his founding of phenomenology, which challenged Wundt's insistence of pure introspection.

In phenomenology, Stumpf examined the experience a person as it occurs, instead of attempting to reduce the experience to elementary elements as Wundt did. Thus, he believed the experience as a whole could not be broken down into basic elements; there is something more that we cannot perceive in consciousness. His discoveries into his theory led him to study music throughout the world. He created a work titled "Lieder der Bellakula Indianer," describing the differing cultural contexts of music and how they use different forms of tonality in their music to convey different emotions to the audience or listener.

There were other interesting things I found about Carl Stumpf's life, such as when he organized a panel to investigate a horse named Clever Hans that supposedly could count. Of course, the horse could not in fact count, and the scheme was uprooted. Stumpf also started the Berlin Association of Child Psychology. Another notable effect of Stumpf's contributions was that his influence on Max Wertheimer, Wolfgang Köhler and Kurt Koffka helped them to found gestalt pyschology.

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Carl_Stumpf
This gives information on Stumpf's work with music as well as some biographical information.

http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/stumpf.html
This discusses Stumpf's disagreement with Wundt and also provides information regarding Stumpf's contributions to psychology.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/stumpf/#PsyMin
This link contains a lot of in-depth information into the many different areas Stumpf made contributions.

1a) State what your topic is.
Wolfgang Kohler

1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
In this chapter Wolfgang Kohler was a founder of Gestalt psychology. He is known as gestalt’s most “influential” spokesperson. Kohler’s research on problem solving in animals is discussed (The Mentality of Apes).

1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I am interested in learning more about Wolfgang Kohler’s background. Also I am interested in learning more about his research on problem solving in animals (apes). Anything dealing with behaviorism I find fascinating. I remember reading in the textbook how Kohler disagreed with Thorndike’s conclusion towards animals learning. I am interested to see if my resources mention anything else about Kohler disagreeing with Thorndike.

Wolfgang Kohler was one of the founders of Gestalt psychology. Gestalt psychology is defined as “view perceptual process as the joining of perceptual elements to form a holistic interpretation of a stimulus, a synergistic collaboration where the parts were far less important than the whole”. Kohler reflected large amounts of energy in the founding of Gestalt psychology. Kohler was known as “the right person at the right time” to help bring this out. Kohler was also famous for his explanations of learning. He did his research with chimpanzees.

Wolfgang Kohler was born on January 21, 1887, in Estonia. When Kohler turned six years old, his family moved to Germany to settle in. Kohler was known as an intelligent child. Kohler and his siblings received the typical Germany education that helped them prepare for their future. During this time Kohler developed an interest in classical music. Between 1905 through 1907 Kohler attended several Universities (Tubingen, Bonn, and Berlin). While attending at the University of Berlin he received a scientific training in chemistry, biology, and physics. During this time Kohler studied Max Planck who inspired his approach to psychology. Kohler then received his Ph.D. in psychology at the University of Berlin in 1909 under Carl Stumpf

After Kohler received his doctorate he became working at the Psychological Institute at the Frankfurt Academy. His work during this time involved the psychological analysis of audition and combination of his training in science and love for music. In 1910 Kohler was introduced to Max Wertheimer and Kurt Koffeka. The three of them began their first subjects in experiments of work which laid the foundation of Gestalt psychology. There work was interrupted in 1913; Kohler was then appointed director of the Anthropoid Research Station. He remained this position until 1920. During this time Kohler began studying problem solving and general intelligence from a group of chimpanzees. His research was focused around animal perceptions, learning, and cognition.

During this time Edward Thorndike had his conclusions on animal learning. His research was done with several animals; dogs, monkeys, and cats. Thorndike was able to conclude that learning is a trial-and-error process which is dependent on punishment and reinforcement. Kohler disagreed with Thorndike’s conclusion and questioned his research dealing with punishment and reinforcement. Instead Kohler decided to take a different approach while doing his research.

Kohler’s first study involved placing chimps in an enclosed area and presented them with a reward that was out of reach. The chimpanzees were provided two bamboo sticks, but neither was long enough to reach the bananas. The only way to reach the banana was putting the two sticks together. Kohler tried to demonstrate to the chimps how to put the bamboo sticks together. After some examination the chimps put the sticks together which allows them to reach the bananas. The next study involved bananas being suspended from the roof. The chimps first tried to use their bamboo sticks, but later figured out they needed to stack the provided boxes on top of one another to get closer to the banana. Kohler then concluded that this described properties of insight learning. First the chimps focused on solving the problem. Second insight learning did not depend on rewards. Lastly once a problem was solved it was easier to solve a similar problem. In 1917 Kohler published his book, “The Mentality of Apes”.

In 1920 Kohler decided to return to Berlin. He became the acting director of the Psychological Institute. He became chair and director from 1922 until 1935. Kohler also held the position of philosophy at the University of Berlin. Kohler continued his Gestalt psychology work with Koffeka and Wertheimer. In 1929 Kohler wrote Gestalt psychology. This described “various aspects of Gestalt theory based on the series of investigations conducted at the Institute”.

In 1925 Kohler spent a year as a professor at Clark University in the United States. During this time the Nazis began to gain power and removed Jewish professors from their positions. Kohler was anger and shocked this was happening. Kohler decided to accept a position at Harvard University and a visiting professor at the University of Chicago In 1935. Kohler made more accomplishments during this time. Kohler was elected to the National Academy of Sciences, awarded the Warren Medal, elected president
of American Psychological Association and many more.

http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/wolfgangkohler.html
I chose this website because it provided information on his background and accomplishments.

http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/kohler.htm
I chose this website because it provided information on Kohler’s research with chimpanzees and disagreement with Thorndike.

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Wolfgang_K%C3%B6hler
I chose this website because it provided information on his background and careers.

1a) State what your topic is.
Semantic network model.
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
In this chapter we learned specifically about semantic organization of knowledge and so we learned about each different model. There were four different models mentioned and those were set theoretical model, semantic feature-comparison model, sematic network model, and the spreading activation model.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
Each one of the four different models were interesting but I found the most interest in the semantic network model. I don’t know if it was because the graphs that were provided for this model helped me to understand what this model was all about or what. But, this model I wanted to learn more information about so I chose to do it for my blog this week.
2) When looking at the definition in the book this model didn’t make a lot of sense but after looking around the internet and finding out more information it started to make more sense. The semantic network model is saying that triggers activate associated memories. So basically a memory of a specific place can activate memories about things that may have happened at that location. An example could be that this semester I have a couple classes in the same room as I did last semester for other classes so when I first went to these rooms I was thinking about what happened in that room with my other classes. These triggers could activate any kind of memory which makes it interesting. That is a more simple definition that is easier for me to remember. A more complex definition of semantic network model is that it is knowledge schemas involving nodes and links between other nodes. The nodes represent objects and concepts that link relations between nodes. The structure of a network defines its meaning. So, a semantic network is most likely to be shown in a graph. There is an example of a semantic network model below.

Because some of these models are so complex they may become hard to understand because it looks chaotic. Semantic networks have been used for many years in artificial intelligence research. Just like any model it can have its limitations. Some limitations brought up with this is there are no formal semantics which is saying there are no agreed-upon notions of what a representational structure exactly means. An example is that a semantic network system is limited by user’s understanding of the meanings of the links in the network. Something that I learned about semantic networks when I did more research was that there are six commonly used kinds of semantic networks. These six kinds of semantic networks are definitional networks, assertional networks, implicational networks, executable networks, learning networks, and hybrid networks.

http://psychology.about.com/od/cognitivepsychology/a/memory.htm
This website mostly talked about memory as a whole but it briefly touched on the idea of semantic network model and what it was.
http://people.duke.edu/~mccann/mwb/15semnet.htm
This website had a lot of information about semantic networks and how they work as well as the limitations that come along with this model.
http://www.jfsowa.com/pubs/semnet.htm
This website had a lot of helpful information about the six commonly used kinds of semantic networks.
http://nlping.com/images/image_ex4/sem_net_ATN1.gif
This website was used to provide my example of a semantic network model.

Wertheimer and Productive thinking
This relates to the chapter since it includes one of the three German Gestalt psychologists. Wertheimer came up with the idea of Productive Thinking, which is where my interest sparked. I thought it was cool that he like other historic psychologists was a man ahead of his time. I also think that the concept of Productive thinking is relevant in today’s society, especially education. As a student, if I am not interested in what I am learning or if things aren’t explained step by step, I don’t really understand the concept as much as when I am fully engaged and interested in what is being said.
Gestalt psychology means a unified whole. Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, and Wolfgang Kohler were the three German founders of Gestalt psychology. The main foundations of the psychology were on perception, memory and learning. Then as time passed, principles such as productive and reproductive thinking came to be. Max Wertheimer was the man to come up with the concept of Productive thinking.
Wertheimer is considered the core of the trio of Gestalt psychologists. His ideas featured the view of thinking proceeds from the whole to the parts and synthesizing rather than the chunking approach. He thought that reductionism was a great problem of his time and expressed a great interest in the process of problem solving. Although he accomplished a great deal in his career, he was still a rather modest man. He had expressed great concern to his visitors as people and was intrigued in what many people considered ordinary things that didn’t really have significance.
In 1945, Wertheimer left an unpublished manuscript which was posthumously published as Productive Thinking. The features of productive thinking can be thought of in four parts. The first is grouping and reorganizing components of a situation. The second includes functioning in relation to characteristics of the whole rather than in different pieces. The third feature is avoiding summing successions of parts or chance occurrences. Finally, the fourth feature said that structural truth leads to sensible expectations and assumptions.
Wertheimer’s model says that genuine thinking starts with a problem. Also, that productive thinking will lead to an understanding that is significant to the objects in the problem. Then in turn this understanding will lead to an abstract thought process applied to future problems. This kind of thinking is used when there is no obvious answer to the problem and requires one to think outside of the box. He believed that teachers and textbook writers should be presenting their material so that the structural feature of a problem is revealed. He was against the idea of repetition as the mother of learning and the negative effects of it such as habituation and mechanization.
Gestalt psychology had a great influence on stimulating psychology as a science. The kind of psychology has been proven to become one the best psychological theories implemented. Many gestalt psychologists in particular, consider Wertheimer as a wave maker that helped create their work.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Max_Wertheimer.aspx
I liked this website because it included lots of details on Wertheimer’s life early on to his accomplishments right before his death along with how Wertheimer was as a person.

http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/wertheimer.html
I liked this website because it gave me a better idea as to how productive thinking can be broken down into four features and more on Wertheimer’s life.

http://www.ukessays.com/essays/psychology/the-history-principles-and-contributions-of-gestalt-psychology-psychology-essay.php
This site included a lot about the different contributions that were laid upon by the gestalt psychologists and how it has greatly impacted the field of psychology.

1a) State what your topic is.
Kurt Lewin.
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
In this chapter it was all about Gestalt psychology and the psychologists who were influenced by it. Lewin developed the Field Theory which he was influenced by Gestalt psychology.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
The whole topic of Gestalt psychology is interesting but I found Lewin to be the most interesting especially his Field Theory. I feel like I haven’t heard a lot of information about Lewin in my psychology courses so it’s always nice to learn about something you didn’t already know.
2
Kurt Lewin as a whole was interesting but I have more interest in his Field Thery. But first I am going to start with a little background information about Lewin. Kurt Lewin first started his studies in behaviorism but then he developed an interest in Gestalt psychology. He volunteered in the German army and these experiences in the army are where he developed the field theory and decided to study group dynamics. He contributed to Gestalt psychology by expanding on the theories and applying them to human behavior and this is where he became the first psychologists to systematically test human behavior. He influenced the idea of experimental psychology, social psychology, and personality psychology. One of the big ideas that he came up with was the field theory. He believed that behavior is determined by totality of an individual’s situation. This theory more specifically examines patterns of interactions between the individual and the “field”, or environment. A “field” according to Lewin is the totality of coexisting facts which are seen as interdependent. Individuals were seen behaving differently if their way may have brought tensions between perceptions of self and of the environment. In one of the articles I found there was a section where Hal and Lindzey summarized the main ideas of Lewin’s field theory which was a lot easier to understand. One was that behavior is a function of the field that exists at the time the behavior occurs. Lastly, they said that he had the idea that analysis begins with the situation as a whole which differentiated the component parts and the concrete person in the situation can be represented mathematically. The last one was a little confusing for me to understand because I don’t get how they are represented mathematically so that is something I need to research more so I can get a clearer understanding. Another big key idea that came from Lewin was group dynamics. There were two main ideas that were developed with group dynamics. One was interdependence of fate and the second was task interdependence. Interdependence of fate was the idea that groups don’t have to necessarily be similar but the group exists when the members realize that their fate depends on the fate of the whole group. The next was task interdependence and this idea was a more significant factor. This idea is saying that there is interdependence in the group member’s goals. So, if the group tasks is where the group is dependent on one another for achievement then a powerful dynamic is created so they are more likely to be successful as a whole group.
http://psycholohttp://muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/lewin.htm#Time Linegy.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm
This website had brief information about group dynamics and a little about Kurt Lewins life.
http://infed.org/mobi/kurt-lewin-groups-experiential-learning-and-action-research/
This website was very helpful for explaining both Lewins field theory and his group dynamics idea.

When reading this chapter, I thought that Max Wertheimer got thrown in a lot with Koffka and Kohler, so the three of them are kind of talked about as one subject. This makes sense since they all did a lot of work within the realm of Gestalt psychology, but I wanted to learn more about Wertheimer as an individual and get a little more information about his theory of productive thinking. As a college student, I strive for (and fall short of) productivity every day, so I thought maybe doing some research on the theory could help me. However, once I started to look up productive thinking, I found that most of the information directed me back to Gestalt theory, or was a book review. So, my topical blog will try to focus on the life of Wertheimer and his contribution to the field of Gestalt psychology.

Wertheimer was born in Prague in 1880. He played the violin as a child and even composed some of his own music, so a lot of people thought that he was destined to become a musician. However, he decided to study law at Charles University in Prague. He never completed his degree in law, though, because he changed his mind to study philosophy after two years. He left for Berlin and studied there for a while, paying particular attention to the philosophy of law and the psychology of courtroom testimony. He later received his Ph.D. from the University of Wurzburg in 1904. While there, he developed the first lie detector for the objective study of courtroom testimony. In 1910, while on vacation after transferring to the University of Berlin, Wertheimer became interested in studying perception, after the experiences he had on his train during his vacation. He wanted to further study the perception of complex and ambiguous structures.

As far as productive thinking goes, Wertheimer’s work was in perceptual grouping. He compared what are minds do to what our minds could have done, which is an interesting spin on things. He also helped to come up with unit forming factors, which help explain how different bits of information are organized and grouped. These consist of: similarity; proximity; common fate; good continuation; set; and past experience. The majority of the way gestaltists would test these different factors are with dot tests, but there are a few different tests that were used as well. I find this really interesting, because our brain is trying to process information as quickly as possible, so it will initially group something based on one factor, but then when we look back and study the information, we realize we made a very simple mistake. This also leads into another topic of optical illusions. These are really fun to look at, but it is also interesting to learn about the mechanics your brain is going through to process the images.

http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~cfs/305_html/Gestalt/gestalt.html
I liked this site because it had a lot of good information specifically about productive thinking and perceptual grouping. It also gave a lot of visual examples, which were really helpful.

http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/gestalt.html
This site had some good information about Wertheimer’s academic life and all of his achievements.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/639896/Max-Wertheimer
This site also had a lot of good information about the academic life of Wertheimer, but it also had some more personal information, which I found pretty interesting.

1a) State what your topic is.
I chose to do more research on the Zeigarnik Effect.
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
Zeigarnik was discussed as being one of Lewin’s students. It talked about a study where people got interrupted when they were most focused on the task at hand.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I think it is cool how she was a woman having so much success. I also think that the idea that memory is better for incomplete rather than complete tasks is interesting.
2) Next, we would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about the topic in a knowledgeable manner. At the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites.
Bluma Zeigarnik was born in 1901 in Prenai, Lithuania. In 1916, after bypassing the first four grades, she enrolled in fifth grade at a girls’ gymnasium in Minsk. Bluma graduated the 7th grade in 1918 with a gold medal. She wanted to go on to a higher education but the school that they had back then for girls did not have a wide variety of subjects. Zeigarnik spent a lot of time in the library studying as she was preparing to go to a university. She met her husband at the library and even though her parents weren’t too thrilled with her choice in husband at first, they ended up paying for them to move to Europe to get an education. Zeigarnik worked with Lewin and in her first study she found that tasks that are interrupted are remembered by adults approximately 90% better than those that are fully completed, and that children, in general, remember only interrupted tasks. Today this is known as the Zeigarnik Effect.
Bluma Zeigarnik first noticed this when she studied waiters and waitresses in a restaurant. She noticed that they could remember uncompleted orders or interrupted tasks better than completed tasks. Kenneth McGraw looked into this about 60 years later and continued some research. He asked participants to do a puzzle but before any of them could solve it, they were interrupted. The incomplete tasks stuck in their head and distracted them from getting other important work done.
The Zeigarnik Effect can come in handy when it comes to advertising. In advertising, you can leave people hanging on by not telling them everything, which will hopefully make them want to know more. The person who is doing the advertising can promise to reveal certain information if the reader does something specific and make sure the reader will benefit from what you have to offer. The Zeigarnik Effect is also being used in headlines. When you read a headline that compels you and you want to read more that is the Zeigarnik Effect. I think knowing that this effect is all around makes it interesting to learn more about.

http://kratovo.livejournal.com/10302.html
I liked this website because it gave me information about Bluma Zeigarnik before she was a Zeigarnik. It was nice to know where she grew and where she studied. This website also gave good information on how she got to know Lewin.

http://davidkanigan.com/2011/10/26/what-is-the-zeigarnik-effect-and-how-does-it-help-you-avoid-distraction-focus-and-get-things-done/
This source was helpful because it discussed what the Zeigarnik Effect was and it was also nice that it talked about McGraw and his study.

http://www.sophieslist.com/another-one-on-the-zeigarnik-effect/
I liked this source the best because it talked about how the Zeigarnik Effect is used today. It was cool to learn the ways that it is used in advertising.

1a) Kurt Lewin and the Field Theory
1b) I feel like I could pick any topic in modern psychology and could somehow reference Lewin. He was very involved in nearly every kind of psychology in one way or another. It is a little disappointing he is lumped with the Gestalt Theorists. I know he bought into their theory but he also expanded some areas of psychology like social and development psychology.
1c) I am interested in Lewin because he was so prolific in many areas of psychology. It is easy to like someone’s work when they are as excited about it as Lewin was. I could write a paper over anyone of his sections in the book, but I chose the field theory because it blends all sorts of psychologies. It has cognitive and behavioral components and can have social contexts too.

Lewin was born on the Polish portion of Prussia a decade before the turn of the century. I do not normally start these things with boring background information, but it will make a reappearance later. His academic career comprised of a few transfers but eventually earned his PhD and the University of Berlin. Initially being trained in behavioral approaches he was soon converted to Gestalt theories. He was in contact with the three founders, mostly Max Wertheimer and Wolfgang Kohler. Lewin eventually ended up working at the Frankfurt School ran by wealthy Jewish gentlemen. He quickly abandoned this position because of Hitler’s rise to power. He did not like Hitler’s strangehold on academia, and Lewin being of Jewish descent also probably played a role. Thus Lewin immigrated to the United States of America to become a prominent member of some of the best national institutes including one here in Iowa. His US career started as a temporary professor at Standford University and then to Cornell University. He then had a decently lengthy stint with the University of Iowa. He was part of the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station, not part of the psychology department. It was here in our corn field of a state that Lewin created some of his best work. He also established the hot-air club; a group of Iowa staff and students who met at a coffee shop that and discussed their ideas. It was here that he developed the field theory.
Being deeply interested in social psychology his theory has an individual and sometimes a social component. Lewin describes that there are two kinds of stimuli, external and internal. External are all the factors in the subjects environment that may be influencing their thoughts and behaviors, and they can varying degrees of influence. This is considered ones life space, but Lewin also said that there were other internal processes that influence how we interact and interpret our life space. Lewin’s theory claims that the person, environment, and personal factors like morals, personality, and goals describes the person at that moment. Gestalt psychologists liked looking at holistic phenomena instead of small components like behaviorism and structuralism. The field theory cannot get much more holistic than this, so clearly Lewin’s Gestalt influence shines through. Lewin also believed how individuals interact, react, and explore their environment could help or hinder development. Field theory states that humans seek equilibrium in their environment and within themselves. Equilibrium can be offset for an infinite amount of reasons. Lewin’s equilibrium became unbalanced when Hitler came to power and instilled an anti-Semitic agenda. Lewin had to resolve this by leaving this country; this is an approach-avoidance conflict because Lewin had to avoid Germany, and go to the next best psychology nation. The US would be considered the valance in this example or the goal to re-establish equilibrium. A vector is the direction and strength of Lewin’s drive to get to his valence. Lastly there are barriers that can influence the vector. In Lewin’s case it could be things like immigration laws, finding jobs, or something physical like crossing the Atlantic.
Lewin was incredibly influential and arguably ahead of his time. In college he was a women’s rights activist and much of psychology research was designed to help people instead of simply learning how they work. He firmly believed that psychology should be used to help people and that his studies were meant to be applied to life. He was also one of the first to endorse an interactionist perspective to the nature vs. nurture debate. It seems passé to us to say they interact, but really Herbert Blumer came out this idea only in 1937. He even applied his field theory to areas like group conflict, learning, and emotions. All in all, Lewin was incredibly influential in many areas of psychology.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Lewin
This source was excellent for Lewin’s background. It also has some good examples of how ahead or at least with the times he was. It has brief summaries for some of theories so I had to go to more supplemental sources of the field theory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force_field_analysis
This was almost exclusively about field theory even though it has a strange title. It is less detailed than the other field theory source, but having a general, applicable view of the theory is sometimes better than learning every little component.

http://www.tavinstitute.org/projects/field-theory-rule/
The field theory is very detailed in this source and it has some real life examples of how it has been applied.

Once you have completed your search and explorations we would like you to:
1a) State what your topic is.
Kurt Lewin.

1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter. 1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
Kurt Lewin was a major leading psychologist in the world of psychology. This chapter covered a lot about Gestalt Psychology. Lewin later on in his life he dipped in the world of Gestalt Psychology. I thought that Kurt Lewin was very interesting because he covered various topics in Psychology. While reading I liked the idea that he went to classrooms to help teachers improve. After doing more research on him, he did a lot with Social Psychology and I took a class over that and was really interested in that.
2) Next, we would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about the topic in a knowledgeable manner. By integrating/synthesizing we mean taking what your read/experienced from the internet search organize the information into the main themes, issues, info, examples, etc. about your topic and then write about the topic in your own words using the information you have about the topic.
Kurt Lewin was born in Prussia to a middle class family in 1890. His family was also Jewish and that came to affect him later on in his life. Around the age of 15, he moved to Berlin, Germany. Not only did he attend school there but he also joined the military. When he first started his studies he was interested in the world of science, but soon began to gain interest in behaviorism. While he was in the military, he became injured. The experiences of him being injured and his interest in behaviorism would help develop his theories and thoughts.
While he was teaching philosophy and psychology at the University of Berlin, Hitler was in full swing of abolishing the Jewish. Lewin thought that because he was an injured German soldier, he would be okay being Jewish. That was not the case, he was in as much danger as the average Jewish person. He was becoming well known in the United States so he was able to escape the danger and immigrated to the United States. Here he took a job at The University of Iowa, he worked there until 1944 but passed away in 1947.
Kurt Lewin was known as ‘The Father of Social Psychology.’ He was also known for being a Developmental Psychologist. One theory that became very important was the Field Theory. This theory was based on our behavior comes from the result of us and the environment. This theory had the stepping stone for Social Psychology, and also in ways showed his work of being a developmental psychologist, stating that our personality traits and the environment come together to cause our behavior. In my Social Psychology class, this is what we learned about. Everything that we do or have a trait of combines with the environment around us to cause our reaction being our behavior.
3) At the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm
This site gave a description on who Kurt Lewin was and his early life. It helped give some further background information that the book did not cover.
http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/gestalt.html
This site showed how Kurt Lewin was involved in Gestalt Psychology. It goes into further detail of what all he did in Gestalt Psychology.
http://psychology.jrank.org/pages/381/Kurt-Lewin.html
This website shows more of what he did after he left The University of Iowa. He traveled to many states to do research.

1) Topic
a. Gestalt Learning Theory
b. It relates to the portion dedicated to Gestalt in the classroom.
c. I am interested in this because I have an interest in education and pedagogy that improves the ways we teach future leaders to learn.
2) Gestalt Learning: There Is No Easy Way To Explain The Theory’s “Whole” Contribution to School
a. Despite my failed attempt at a pun for the title above, it is a lie; Gestalt Learning Theory is a magnificent way to view learning and should be implemented into future pedagogy training for our teachers. As we know, Gestalt Theory originally came from a trio of Psychologists: Wertheimer, Kohler, and Koffka. It isn’t named after anyone in particular and wasn’t even named by the trio. Graf Christian von Ehrenfels coined the name Gestalt Theory, because in German it means something like shape or form. It is an uneasy translation that ultimately refers to the theory being about the whole of the mind rather than its individual parts.
Although it is a theory about the entire mind and not just about perception, it is the perception piece that factors into Gestalt Learning. This theory depicts several laws that explain how humans naturally form and organize perceptions. These factors are: Closure, Proximity, Similarity, Figure-Ground Effect, and Trace Theory.
Closure is when the brain tries to complete an incompleteness of something. Something could be an “image, sound, thought or feeling…presented as a [incomplete] stimulus…” and the brain would actively complete it. Proximity is vital to literature and the fine arts because it is the law that states when things are close together they are seen as wholes. For instance: “Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.” This is how I failed my English classes…I misspelled a word and my eyes would travel right over it when I proof read.
Similarity points to the fact that humans like to group similar ideas together. This is great for the learning environment because it supports the practice of teaching like-minded ideas together before contrasting them “with opposing or complementary sets of ideas.” Teach the basics of something before moving on. Figure-Ground Effect says we see the objects and not the spaces or holes in between.
Lstly, you have the Trace Theory. This is something we learn in the basic course of psychology. It is the concept of thoughts and ideas being linked by repetition and distinction to make “traces” that allow us to map out our own thoughts on a subject; consequently, allowing us to store and recollect knowledge for longer periods. On a side note, I like the word make distinctive. What could that possibly mean…I think it hints towards the idea of making it unique to the mind of which this idea or piece of information is going into…. AKA: Making it relevant to them…if it isn’t relevant, than it isn’t going to stick.

http://www.douglastwitchell.com/scrambled_words.asp
-The messed up words.
http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/gestalt.htm
-The vocabulary behind Gestalt.
http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/gestalttheory.html
-The term gestalt and the laws of learning.

1a) State what your topic is.
Kurt Lewin

1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
Gestalt psychology became very popular in 1910 because of Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, and Wolgang Kohler. Gestalt psychology was the theory that the mind creates a global whole with self-organizing tendencies. In other words, the whole is the sum of all its parts. Kurt Lewin was a part of the Gestalt vision and he wanted to expand the vision. Lewin's field theory is centered on the concept of the life space, which includes all of the factors influencing a person's actions in a given moment. Lewin was a committed activist and believed that his research should contribute to society. His "action research" has social relevance still today.

1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I became interested in Lewin when I learned that he was an activist that wanted a better society. He wasn't just doing experiments because they seemed interested, he actually cared about the research he was doing and someone that actually cares about the research would be work even harder. Lewin had psychologists before him like Freud who argued that human behavior is a result of past experiences. He also had other psychologists argue that people must be understood holistically, according to all of their elements and their interactions with surrounding environment. Lewin's activism is what expanded and changed Gestalt psychology and that is what interested me.

2) Next, we would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it.

Behaviorists believed that behavior is dictated by the environment alone. In 1920, Lewin made the claim that behavior is a result of both the individual and the environment. He developed a field theory that explored the forces and factors that influence any given situation. He identified two opposing forces present in any given field; helpful forces and hindering forces. Lewin's change model says that in order for a change behavior to take place, details about both the individual and the environment must be taken into account. As a change occurs, more key qualities and values of a system are revealed. This means that the change process itself offers important information about a system. He came to the conclusion that we cannot understand a system until you try to change it. His changed model described a three-step process for achieving personal or organizational transformation. The first step is unfreezing beliefs or recognizing that changed is necessary. The second stage is actually making the change and the third step is "freezing" and this occurs when a new mindset is crystallized and there is an accompanying sense of comfort and stability within the new framework. The last step is the most difficulty stage. Lewin's pioneering experimental work into social systems has led him to be recognized as the founder of social psychology. His work using group dynamics has been widely influential.

http://muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/lewin.htm#Theory
This website gave me information about Lewin's life and also some of his other theories like the integration of negros.

http://www.tavinstitute.org/projects/field-theory-rule/
This website gave me information about Lewin's field theory and other information about Lewin's life and research.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/338099/Kurt-Lewin
This website gave me more information about what Lewin thought about human behavior compared to behaviorists.

1a) This week I chose to do my topical blog on Kurt Koffka.


1b) This chapter discussed quite a bit concerning his contributions to gestalt psychology. It also got into areas he was involved with such as brain injury and his influence with women psychologists in the field.


1c) I find it interesting how he contributed to so many different areas. I really like how he took a positions at a college for women and pushed for their rights as psychologists as well as allowed them to join in on his topology group while individuals in the past such as Tichener kept them out. I thought it would be interesting to take a closer look at his life and all he accomplished.

2)

German psychologist, Kurt Koffka was born in Berlin in March of 1886. His mother Lewis was of Jewish decent. His father, Emil, was a lawyer. His younger brother Friedrich went on to become a judge. His family was well known for having more than one generation in the legal professions. In his early years his uncle whom was a biologist helped to educate Koffka. He influenced him into the areas of philosophy and science.
He attended the University of Berlin as a philosophy student and ended up earning his Ph.D there in 1909. During his time there he became a student of well known Carl Stumpf. He as well spent a year at the University of Edingburgh, located in Scotland. While in Scotland Koffka was able to develop a strong fluency in English which eventually led him to spread gestalt psychology beyond the German borders. He is the one responsible for bringing the area into the United States. When he returned to Berlin he changed his focus from philosophy to psychology. He had a very wide range of interests from hearing impairments of brain-damaged patients to developmental psychology.
Also in 1909 Koffka married Mira Klein, one of his experimental subjects for his research. The two were married for fourteen years until 1923 when they divorced. He went on to marry Elisabeth Ahlgrimm who had just finished up getting her Ph. D at Gissen. They got divorced that same year and Koffka once again married his first wife, Klein.
One of his greatest contributions, along with Max Wetheimer and his associate Wolfgang Kohler, was the establishment of Gestalt Psychology. Just a year before his divorce, in 1922, American psychologists had become exposed to Gestalt Psychology through Koffka’s article which was entitled, Perception: An Introduction to the Gestalt-Theorie. During World War 1 Koffka worked for the military, a position which in turn led to a professorship in experimental psychology. After gaining a professorship at Giessen he became the director of the Psychology Institute and established his own laboratory. His work with brain-damaged soldiers allowed him to develop the widely adopted evaluation methods for such patients. During 1927 he took a position at the Smith College in Massachusetts, where he stayed until his death.
In 1935 Koffka wrote his famous work, Principles of Gestalt Psychology. It is most noted for its areas which focus on perception, learning and memory. One of his major contributions as well was his text, The Growth of the Mind which was published in 1921. Koffka was trying to provide evidence that supported Gestalt psychology with the field of developmental psychology. This text was translated to english in 1928. This same year he divorced his first wife one more time and again married his second wife Ahlgrimm. He believed that a great majority of learning occurred through imitation. He specifically noted that an important time in a child’s development is during the time when they realize that objects have names.
His ideas pertaining to perception, interpretation and learning had great influence on American education theories and policies. He had color-blindness and one of his first published works concerned this area. Eventually Koffka developed heart disease and died in the year 1941 from coronary thrombosis. Today, Gestalt Psychology had built onto Koffka’s ideas regarding developing effective methods for promoting self-healing and personal growth.

3)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Koffka

This site included a lot of information. It was all in chronological order and contained a table of contents. It started off with Koffka’s earlier life and academic career and ended with his publications and contributions to psychology.

http://psychology.jrank.org/pages/361/Kurt-Koffka.html

This site as well had a lot of good information. It was all very informative. It started off with his personal life and went in depth concerning his contributions to Gestalt Psychology. It also discussed his influence on child developmental theories and texts he published.

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Kurt_Koffka

This site started off with a summary. It once again went in chronological order from his earlier years and got into depth concerning some areas of his work on things such as perception. It all well included all of his contributions and legacy he left within the field.

1a) Kurt Lewin

1b) Lewin was a very important psychologist in the Gestalt psychology, and was seen as the founder of social psychology. He made an impact in both areas. Lewin made great discoveries in the area of social psychology and he used some of his Gestalt principles to help him in this area.

1c) I am curious to find out what he did for social psychology. What are some of his discoveries and what impact did he have on this are. Also I am curious to find out more about group dynamics.

2) Kurt Lewin was born in Prussia to Jewish family. He was involved in many different things before beginning work at the Gestalt school of psychology. Some of the things he was involved in women’s rights, serving in the German army for World War I. He also studied medicine and biology before moving his focus to psychology. After doing much of his work in Europe he moved to the U.S. in 1933.
Much of what Lewin taught was developing a theory and then testing the hypothesis that was developed through experimentation. He believed in discipline when dealing with group dynamics and action research when dealing with experiments, and he believed that this was very important. Kurt Lewin created The Research Center for Group Dynamics at MIT. This center was created through his interest in what he called “life space” and the dynamics of group. He wanted to apply his findings the problems that were important to society. His focus was studying “the processes that influence individuals in group situations, and the center initially focused on group productivity; communication; social perception; intergroup relations; group membership; leadership and improving the functioning of groups” (RCGD). At the beginning of when this research was being done, outsiders believed that there wasn’t a thing such as group phenomena. To justify his theory of this he used his interactionism formula which is B=f(P,E). His theory stated that a group is a united system with interrupting characteristics that can’t be assumed by independently. Overall, Lewin means that a group is made up of a “sum” of everyone individual in the group. What they wanted to accomplish at the center was to actually apply these theories and discoveries into real life. Many of these discoveries have been put in place and used in education, industrial areas, and different communities. The RCGD is still very active and still holds the same goals that were established by Lewin when he created it. It has since moved to Michigan but is still very active in its research. I think that this is so interesting because his program is still very much alive.

3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Lewin
-This site was great for background on Lewin and his group dynamics.
http://muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/lewin.htm
- This site was useful for information on Lewin’s group theories and his work
http://www.rcgd.isr.umich.edu/history/
- This site was great for finding out about Lewin and also the impact his Center had on social psychology.

1. J
a. The topic I chose to research more is apparent motion.
b. This topic relates to the chapter, because it was briefly discussed and introduced by mechanisms used by Wertheimer within his experiments.
c. I am interested in this topic, because my brother is a cinematographer and has mentioned this term a few times to me while he edits videos and photos as well as when we are watching movies. Another reason I chose to study this topic a little more is because currently in my humanities class, the term chiaroscuro was introduced, which is essentially the same concept, yet used in paintings.
2. After Max Wetheimer founded Gestalt psychology (suggests people perceive an object as individual parts to a whole) he came up with the idea of apparent motion. The idea of apparent motion is that stationary items or people would appear to be moving, in motion, or appear a different size by a play of light or flashing light and object placement, basically an optical illusion. In the psychology world this term is actually more widely known as the phi phenomenon. This term was coined by Max Wertheimer within Gestalt psychology and the study of perception or more closely related, motion perception. Although I couldn’t find much on the actual topic of apparent motion, I found its trickling effects in the study of psychology. After Wertheimer’s publication of his ideas on apparent motion, many new research ideas and theory’s based on perception were sparked in the minds of many other psychologists. According to www.sciencedirect.com Wertheimer’s paper on apparent motion was perceived as a revolution in perception. While researching this topic, I found many examples of optical illusions which resulted in a distorted perception of what you’re actually looking at. It was slightly frustrating that you know your eyes are about to be tricked into seeing what the psychologists wants you to see, yet the way the eye perceives the world leaves you crippled in trying to defy the experiment. Before technology came into play, an Italian artist by the name of Caravaggio coined a technique called chiaroscuro, which is the play of light and shadows to create a visualization effect of motion. Although the lack of technology denied Caravaggio the privilege of creating an optical illusion, it’s essentially the same concept. After learning about Caravaggio and chiaroscuro, I began to wonder, just how many spin offs are there of visual perception and defying the human eye and mind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestalt_psychology
This website gave me the information on how the idea of apparent motion formulated and the ideas it sparked from there.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0042698900000869
This website provided the information needed on how Wertheimer’s ideas of apparent motion sparked many more studies and question within the idea of motion perception.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/phi+phenomenon
This website gave me information on the idea of phi phenomenon and it’s origin.

1a) Kurt Lewin and the Field Theory
1b) This topic relates to the chapter because not only is Lewin a part of the chapter when it comes to his contributions to psychology but also when it comes to he was one of the first people to bring psychology to America. The fact that he became a founder of the Gestalt approach as well as took ideas from the Gestalt approach and formed his own theory from it. The fact that he elaborated more on previous chapters of perception and experiences, how experiences are created.
1c) I am interested in it because perception and reality are interesting to me, how people form memories and gain knowledge from experiences interest me. The fact that through experience people learn so therefore every experience is different and you learn something different from each experience, but finding inner peace with every situation is the ultimate goal in life. The fact that people need to be at peace with what has happened in life and how they chose to live their life is what makes a person who they are.
2) Kurt Lewin was a German Psychologist that ended up moving to America after the First World War broke out due to the prosecution of Jews. Lewin began teaching at Cornell and Stanford before he finally found his home in America and settled down in Iowa becoming a Professor at University of Iowa. Lewin was known as one of the founders of Gestalt view of psychology but he took parts of the Gestalt view and applied it to what he was interested in and that was the human’s need and experiences. Lewin believed that an individual is influenced by both the individual themselves as well as the environment that the individual is in when the event occurs. Basically every individual is directed by their internal needs, these desires are what guide the person in their actions, but when a person is in different situations they will react differently to each desire that they feel at that time. Lewin came up with the field theory; this theory contained the idea that every person has multiple aspects to their lives in order to live a balanced and happy life. Part of the field theory is the life space, this is the part of a person’s life that grows as they gain experience. In order for a person to be able to make it and control these desires they learn, without learning from these experiences they would not be able to reach their ultimate goal in life, equilibrium. As their life changes and their balances change. In 1930 (www.lifecircles-inc.com) Lewin decided to show this path to equilibrium visually for people to understand creating the topological map. This map consists of pathways and obstacles that are learning experiences for individuals. The obstacles are the factors that influence an individual’s behavior, each situation has a learning experience for the individual. In this learning experience people learn to control and determine their actions, i.e., do they fulfill their wants or their needs? This battle of meeting your wants over your needs create a tension in the individual’s life but after they solve the problem the tension is released. Over time people learn to control their desires and move toward meeting their needs. In the end from learning to control their desires they reach equilibrium (a sense of peace); the ultimate goal of everyone’s life.
3) http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1074712/field-theory
I chose this site because it gave a brief overview of the field theory and what it entails.
http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/Lewin.html
I chose this site because it talks more about Lewin himself and what influenced the field theory as well as what the field theory was more in detail.
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm
I chose this site because it gave a more laid out timeline of what happened when in Lewin’s life as well as when the field theory came about.

1a) Putting gestalt psychology into practice in therapy
1b) How does it relate to the chapter? In this chapter the textbook discussed the history of gestalt psychology, but mostly dealt with the raw concepts and biographies of selected psychologists. Gestalt therapy makes use of the ideology that therapy is most effective when personal responsibility and client/therapist interaction are emphasized. More broadly this relates to the chapter in that it extracts the gestaltist principles and theories laid out in the chapter and demonstrates these in a more physical than theoretical setting.
1c) Why interested? I couldn’t really connect with the chapter as well as I had been able to with previous, so I decided to find something that I related to within the school of thought of gestaltism. The application of this kind of psychology within the context of therapy appealed to me because it brought the concepts to life and allowed me to understand how the concepts could be used in terms outside of experimental psychology.
2) Synthesis. Gestalt therapy began in the 1940’s and 1950’s with its founders Frederick ‘Fritz’ and Laura Perls. Fritz Perls was born in Berlin where he experienced expressionism and influence from eastern culture that was part of the Bohemian movement. He later served in the German army during World War I and was trained as a surgeon. Fritz became interested in psychology after working with Wilhelm Reich and went on to become a psychiatrist. Along with his wife, who had a doctorate in psychology as well, Fritz escaped Germany in 1933 to avoid oppression for his Jewish heritage and went to South Africa. Together they founded the Gestalt Institute in 1952 where Fritz would see clients from the couple’s apartment in Manhattan. It wouldn’t be until the 1960’s however that Fritz would establish his own practice in California. After Fritz’s death another prominent gestalt therapist named Jim Sipkin continued to train psychologists in the model and refine the therapy further.
Gestalt therapy was heavily influenced by psychoanalysis, gestalt psychology, and existential philosophy. The practice of the therapy differs from behavioral therapy such as CBT in that it doesn’t attempt to change harmful behaviors, but instead these behaviors are explored in the present situation and used by the therapist to help the client experience life more fully. The aim of this therapy is to focus on the here and now and to strip away the extraneous levels of the present and focus on what is actually happening instead of talking about what could be happening. For example, in the videos Fritz Perls redirects the focus of his client to her physical actions and asks her to describe ‘what’ she is doing as opposed to ‘why’ she was doing them. The concept of ‘self’ and ‘others’ is also important in gestalt therapy; the self is believed to be conditional and exist only with the presence of the other. Since the other and self are so interdependent, and since co-creation of the self and present is emphasized, the therapist experience within gestalt therapy is seen as just as important as the client’s experience. Overall, gestalt therapy and psychology are not the same thing, however the therapy’s formation was intimately influenced by the psychology and puts its concepts to use in a practical application that aims to improve the lives of others.

http://gestalt.on.ca/about-us/what-is-gestalt-therapy/
This article from the Gestalt Institute at Toronto outlines the premise of gestalt psychology and goes into detail about the history of the therapy as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestalt_therapy
I chose this article because it covered a multitude of topics within gestalt psychology and talked about how gestalt therapy is used currently as opposed to how it used to be practiced in its beginning.
http://youtu.be/Kae5RK3JQCs?list=PLWKL-vZE4b3ApL8kTHbRw0NheNBrAuDXg
http://youtu.be/n2CtRKej7dw?list=PLWKL-vZE4b3ApL8kTHbRw0NheNBrAuDXg
I chose these videos, which are part 1 and 2 of Fritz Perl’s brief lectures and his work with a client, because they deal with and demonstrate the practice of gestalt therapy.

My topic is over Max Wertheimer. He relates to the chapter because he was one of the founders for Gestalt psychology. I chose to write about him because I like to learn about peoples past and how they grew up and what led them to their discoveries. Max was born in Prague in 1880. Max, his brother, and his parents were active in the Jewish community. Both of Max’s parents were intellectual, and his dad was a good educator, so Max had great education growing up. Max became interested in philosophy when he received a philosophy book as a gift. Max studied law at Charles University for a year, then went to study philosophy at the University of Berlin. From there he went to the University of Wurzburg to earn his PhD and did research on the lie detector. Max eventually made his way of to the United States in 1933, where he taught at a University in New York. He led research there and because of him, the school became one of the leading schools for psychology. He stayed in New York until he died in 1943 from a coronary embolism. Max made a lot of contributions to psychology. He was also interested in perception. He realized he was interested in this while watching flashing lights on a train create an illusion of movement. Because of that Max did a lot of research over apparent motion. While doing research in this area he concluded “we perceive whole, meaningful figures, not elements that somehow combine to form wholes.” This all contributed to his future research. Max is known for working with two colleagues, Wolfgang Kohler and Kurt Koffka. The biggest contribution Max left behind was probably being one of the founders for Gestalt psychology. The gestalt theory was based off of “grouping” of visuals and other stimuli. This caused the person to interpret a problem in a certain way. So Max took this theory and came up with gestalt psychology, basically saying that it is better to treat a problem as a whole, or group, than to treat it as separate parts. The famous catchphrase from this is, “The whole of an experience is greater than the sum of its individual parts.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Wertheimer
I used this site because it had a lot of information about Max’s early life.
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesmz/p/max-wertheimer.htm
I used this site because it backed up other information I read, and had some more information about his life and contributions.
http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/wertheimer.html
I used this site because it gave me a lot of information about the gestalt theory.

1a) Kurt Lewin and Social Psychology

1b) This chapter was all about Gestalt psychology, which is mainly a study of perception and later cognition. Although Lewin did not really consider himself a Gestalt psychologist, he recognizes that he owes a lot to those Gestalt psychologists that came before him. He is quoted by the author explaining that the research done in this area are “the foundation” of the study of his areas of research.

1c) I chose this topic because social psychology is an area that I have become increasing interested in over the last few years. Learning about this area of psychology has actually helped me decide what I wanted to do for a career.

2) Kurt Lewin was born to a Jewish family in Prussia, and later moved to Berlin to attend the Gymnasium. He later attended the University of Frieberg where he studied medicine before he transferred to the University of Munich to study biology. He completed his doctoral degree at the University of Berlin. He originally had an interest in behaviorism, but became increasingly interested in Gestalt psychology. He volunteered for the German in army in 1914 and was injured in combat. This, among other things, influenced the theories and research that we have today (About, Lewin Biography).

His contributions to psychology were great. From our textbook, we saw that many saw him as a developmental psychologist. However, he felt that his identity in psychology was much more wide-spread than that. One topic that our text mentioned and I researched in a little more depth was Lewin’s study of leadership. Lewin gave three types of leadership: authoritarian, participant (or democratic), and delegative (or laissez-faire). The authoritarian style is, in group situations, typically used when there is little time for delegation. The leader using this style often makes decisions without the consent of the rest of the group. Abuse of this type of leadership typically shows the leader being bossy, controlling, and often acting similar to a dictator. The participant leadership style is one that resembles a democracy. The leaders of these groups would provide guidance to the other members, but would also contribute to the activity and allow input from others in the group. The delegative style of leadership is one in which the leader offers little to know guidance to his/her members. This type of leadership would work well if the members of the group had expertise, but typically this style is not very effective (About Three Types of Leadership).

Using the types of leadership listed previously, Lewin, along with a group of other researchers, studied male children at the age of ten. They placed the children in groups of five and each group had a different type of leadership to which it was assigned (Goodwin 2012). The boys in the authoritarian group were productive, but lacked creativity in their project. The boys in the participant group were not as productive as the boys in the authoritarian group, but what work they did complete was of higher quality. The boys from the delegative group were very demanding of their leader. They also did not cooperate and were unable to work independently (About Three Types of Leadership).

It was because of this, and other “pioneering work” that he did for group dynamics observing of behavior that he is often called the “Father of Social Psychology” (About Biography of Lewin). Lewin believed that behavior should be thought of as a continuous, changing aspect of humans. He explains that our behaviors are based on events in our lives and the world around us at that particular point in time. In order to understand someone’s behavior, you need to understand their total “lifespace.” This means that you need to know the totality of their psychological field from which they are acting with this behavior (Britannica).

http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm

I chose to use this website because it provided me with a background to Lewin’s life.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/338099/Kurt-Lewin

I chose this website because it helped me understand what he believed about behavior and why humans act the way that they do.

http://psychology.about.com/od/leadership/a/leadstyles.htm

I chose this website because it expanded upon what I had read in the text about the study conducted researching the three types of leadership.

For this week’s assignment I chose to research what is known as figure ground segregation. Figure ground segregation was discussed in this week’s chapter that contained Gestalt psychology. It’s defined as the inability to separate an object from its background. It is often the basis for optical illusions and is used widely in art work. I chose to further research this topic because the art aspect interests me.
Our vision is a very complex system. It contains different parts that all play a role in how we perceive the world around us. From the back of the brain in the visual cortex, two different pathways going opposite directions play a huge part in perceiving information. The dorsal pathway, leading to the parietal lobe, deals with identifying objects. The ventral pathway that leads to the temporal lobe, is what tells us where what we are seeing is located. Together these pathways let us know what we are looking at, and where it’s at. But what happens when you are unable to tell the object from the background? When the two objects are hard to separate and seem to merge into one thing or another? That is where figure ground segregation comes into play. Figure ground segregation causes the ventral and dorsal pathways to sort of fight it out. They struggle going back and forth trying to make sense of the object. The struggle causes the object or picture to change from being one thing or the other. One of the most common picture known as an example is the vase picture by Edgar Rubin. In his picture you either see two faces from the profile point of view, or a vase; but never both at the same time. Brain imaging can be done to see what area of the brain is being used when looking at the photo, and it can go back and forth between the two pathways. While figure ground segregation is discussed in Gestalt psychology and among scientists in the health field, it is also commonly used in artwork as optical illusions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figure%E2%80%93ground_%28perception%29
was used as a guide to the topics definition and uses.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-streams_hypothesis
was a good information source on the scientific side of the topic. . even though I should have this down since I’m currently studying this exact thing in biopsychology.

http://www.laurenscharff.com/courseinfo/SL04/FigureGround.pdf
like wikipedia’s information on the topic but much more in depth.

Forgot to post this last night, and then I posted it on last week! Sorry (I'm really embarrassed right now.)

1a) State what your topic is.
I’m going to look at the Zeigarnik effect.
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
This relates to the chapter because it is one of the studies that Lewin and his students did about an observation they made while at a café about how a waiter would know their orders without writing anything down, and then forget what each person ordered after the bill was settled and the tension was released. The Zeigarnik effect shows that people remember better when they have been interrupted as opposed to uninterrupted tasks, and that was because there was unrelieved tension about the task that was incomplete.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I am interested in this because I find it to be a fascinating concept, and I have experienced this myself with shopping without my bank ledger. I can remember the exact amounts I spent at each store before I write them down, but once I write them down and walk away, I have a hard time remembering what the amounts were after I put them in. This is because the there is no longer a real need to remember the amounts (at least for me) after I have written them down.

The Zeigarnik effect is sometimes referred to as the Ovsiankina effect and demonstrates how Gestalt psychology is also present when it comes to cognition and was studied in 1927. Zeigarnik effect is concept that people remember tasks in which they were interrupted or did not get a chance to complete better than those that were completed. It is named after Bulma Zeigarnik, a Russian psychologist who studied under Kurt Lewin. It started when Lewin noticed how a waiter could remember everyone’s specific orders without writing anything down, and then after the check were all sorted and everyone had paid, he could no longer remember the details of the orders. However, the reliability of this has come into crossfire over the years. Some repeat studies have not been able to find differences that were statistically significant between incomplete and completed tasks and memory. Lewin believed that we have tension when we begin a task, and that the tension is relieved when it is completed, and thus, when we are interrupted or unable to complete a task, the tension remains and we are more able to recall details about that task rather than something that we have completed. This is best represented in short-term memory, where we repeat things so that they do not disappear, and the more things we must repeat, the harder it can become, and once things are completed, we tend to drop those things and remember new ones. This can also happen longer-term when there is some conflict in which we cannot get to or solve, such as a problem in the workplace over the weekend, or a question on a test you weren’t sure about. The Zeigarnik effect can be applied to studying, and relates to the importance of breaks in between study sessions in order to remember things more clearly. It can also be applied to stress and how to reduce it, ending procrastination, working more effectively, as well as a variety of other topics which are still very prevalent today. John Gottman, a relationship psychologist, applied the Zeigarnik effect to relationships, and how after a couple reaches an understanding of one another, the relationship grows and the argument is forgotten. However, if the argument is not settled in a proper way, the hurt feelings resurface over and over, and can cause an increase in negative attitudes towards one-another.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluma_Zeigarnik
General background information, alternate name, contradictory study results, John Gottman example
http://changingminds.org/explanations/memory/zeigarnik_effect.htm
Short-term memory, waiters, date it was studied
http://www.sevencounties.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=37538&cn=117
http://99u.com/workbook/28021/end-procrastination-with-the-zeigarnik-effect
http://blog.sandglaz.com/zeigarnik-effect-scientific-key-to-better-work/
http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2014/05/work-smarter-use-the-zeigarnik-effect.html
All different examples of the Zeigarnik effect in use today.

1a) State what your topic is.
Max Wertheimer and the Phi Phenomenon
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
Max Wertheimer, along with Wolfgang Kohler and Kurt Koffka, discovered Gestalt psychology. Gestalt psychology deals with the minds organization and perception of the real world. This phenomenon was an area that Wertheimer felt was important enough to study in this science, therefore it is an important aspect to Gestalt Psychology.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
I am interested in this because it is something I am not able to grasp simply from reading text about it. If I could research it more, I might be able to fully grasp this concept.
2)
Watching movies, television, etc. is one of America’s favorite pastimes. The movement of characters on a screen brings a story to life, and we are entertained. What we don’t realize is that these characters aren’t actually moving at all. Several pictures in succession of one another make it seem as though these images are moving, and that we are viewing a window into some other character’s reality. This illusion of movement from motionless pictures is called The Phi Phenomenon. The Phi Phenomenon is an illusion that causes a person to believe stationary objects are moving, sometimes in a sequence. Here is an example: If two lights are next to each other, such as this…
O O
And one turns off…
O __
And then comes back on while the other turns off…
__O
It looks as though the light is moving back in forth, but in reality each light is just switching. This is the same kind of simulation Max Wertheimer did in his experiments. Wertheimer chose to research this because it was previously thought that this concept was due to humans perceiving multiple items at once, but Wertheimer felt that this was due to humans perceiving the stimulus as a whole. This is also sometimes referred to as, “Apparent Motion”. However, Wertheimer preferred the term, “Phi Phenomenon” over because “Apparent Motion” implies that the motion isn’t actually perceived. Koffka and Kohler also aided Wertheimer in his studies of this. They came to the conclusion that this phenomenon happens because due to, “an electrical charge passing across the brain giving a sense of movement” according to the new encyclopedia.In 1912, Wertheimer published his findings in his seminal paper, “Experimental Studies on the Perception of Motion.”, and this is the first time the world was ever informed of the Phi Phenomenon as Wertheimer had researched it. Wertheimer was so intrigued by this, he went on to study “pure movement”. According to the New World Encyclopedia, this mean, “Movement that does not involve perceiving the movement of any object.” There is also a, “color phi phenomenon” which is similar to the phi phenomenon, but deals with perceived motion from changing colors rather than changing light. Ultimately, scientists still don’t completely understand why the phi phenomenon happens, but it is most likely due to physiological rather than psychological components, and involves communication between the optic nerve and the brain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2-swEdDXsc
(I used this source because it was much easier to understand the phi phenomenon in a video than it was in text. This video demonstrates the phi phenomenon with lights)

http://www.psychologynoteshq.com/phi-phenomenon-and-psychology/
(This site explained the phi phenomenon to be applicable in real life, such as in motion pictures. It also describes the experiment in which Max Wertheimer implemented his research on this. I liked this site mostly because of the real life application of this phenomenon)

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Phi_phenomenon
(I chose this site because it had a lot of credible articles to back it. It also gave a lot of extensive information about the phi phenomenon, such as the idea of pure movement that Wertheimer would eventually research and the color phi phenomenon)

1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.
The topic I chose to research more in depth is Kurt Lewin. He is relevant to this week’s discussions as we read about in the chapter nine. Many would consider Kurt Lewin a neo-gestaltist as he himself did not identify with a Gestalt psychologist title. He was known for his work in the areas of developmental and social psychology and was greatly influenced by the three well-known Gestalt psychologists Wertheimer, Koffka, and Kohler. I was interested to learn more about his work because I am very interested in social and developmental aspects of psychology as I hope to work with children in my future career as a psychologist.

2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?
For this assignment, I will focus on Kurt Lewin. The three aspect I would like to go into further detail is who he was (upbringing and educational background), what exactly he did during his time at the University of Iowa, and his greatest theories and contributions to psychology.

3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.
Kurt Lewin was born on September 9, 1890 in Prussia (what is now known as Poland). Lewin and his family moved to Berlin in 1905 when he was 15 years old. He began his college career at the University of Freiberg in the area of medicine. He then transferred to the University of Munich to study biology. After hopping around colleges, he settled down at the University of Berlin where he earned a PhD. He was a well-educated man who felt the pressures and stress of Hitler’s regime. He made a smart move and fled Germany to reside in the United States just like a few of the Gestalt psychologists before him (Wertheimer, Koffka, Kohler).
Although Kurt Lewin did not recognize himself as a Gestalt psychologist, he was greatly influenced by this area of psychology. He tended to focus his studies on motivation, emotion, personality, and social forces on human behaviors rather than the ideal Gestalt subjects of perception, learning, and cognition. Some might go as far as referring to him as a neo-gestaltist due to his ability to take the Gestalt model and apply it to everyday situations. He was very interested in the areas of developmental psychology and social psychology. While reading the textbook, it was refreshing to read that Kurt Lewin in fact had spent time here in Iowa. He was a professor of Child Psychology at the University of Iowa until 1944.
During his time here in Iowa, he worked at the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station. This particular station began in the year 1914 and was open until the year 1974. The purpose of this station was to "Give the normal child the same scientific study by research methods that we give to crops and cattle.” Which in all actuality makes sense. We are all humans and we were all little children at one point in our lives. Childhood is an important aspect to study, especially from a developmental standpoint. At the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station, they were able to study children using intelligence test measures. This ties into chapter eight of our textbooks that we just discussed last week in class. Similar to what our textbook had explained, we previously thought intelligence was stable and could not be changed. Research conducted here in Iowa at the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station showed that early intervention through educational programs could raise a child’s IQ. This discovery helped pave the way for Head Start programs here in Iowa. I am familiar with Head Start programs as I was a child who received these services when I was young and my two youngest brothers are also receiving these services. I think proactive action is very important in the developmental milestones of children.
Kurt Lewin also made many other contributions to psychology throughout his life. Some may even go as far as saying he contributed more empirical evidence than the three well-known Gestalt founders combined. Lewin came up with a field theory. The field theory examines the patterns of interaction between an individual and their total field or environment. He came up with the equation B = f (P,E). Which means the behavior of an individual at a certain moment is dependent or is a function of the person (their personality, needs, goals, beliefs) and the environment. This formula is well known in the area of social psychology and seems rather simple, but has a made a great contribution to understanding human behavior as a whole. He also studied the process of differentiation. He would give a child a toy and then remove the toy, by doing so he would study the frustration levels. He concluded the frustration resulted in the regressive behaviors lower than the child’s developmental level.
One great quote by Kurt Lewin that truly embodies what he believed psychology must do is to “be equally concerned with discovering how people can change their ways to that they learn to behavior better.” He did not want to study something just for the sake of studying it. He wanted to bring about social change. He founded the Research Center for Group Dynamics which was affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. He studied topics like interracial housing, in-group loyalty, leadership, group dynamics, and modern experimental social psychology. He is still recognized today at the founder of social psychology. What does that have to do with Gestalt psychology? Gestalt psychology failed to become a major force in American psychology but its influence gave birth to many great psychologists and their work. Overall, the three Gestalt psychologists, Wertheimer, Koffka, Kohler, and even Lewin, gave us considerable insight into the knowledge and understanding of our human experiences.

4)
URL 1: http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/Lewin.html This particular website provided me with great background information on Kurt Lewin, specifically his educational background.
URL 2: http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm This website provided me with great insight on who Kurt Lewin was. A complete section was dedicated to quotes he made throughout his research. After reading many of his quotes I was able to grasp a greater understanding of how passionate and educated he was in the matter of psychology.
URL 3: http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu/ictcs/icwrs.html . This particular website provided me with information about the Iowa Child Research Station Lewin worked at while his stay at the University of Iowa.

Terminology: Kurt Lewin, Gestalt Psychology, Wertheimer, Koffka, Kohler, motivation, emotion, personality, perception, learning, cognition, neo-gestaltist, developmental psychology, social psychology, Iowa Child Welfare Research Station, intelligence test, Head Start Programs, field theory, B = f (P , E), differentiation, frustration level, regressive behavior, The Research Center for Group Dynamics.
Word Count: 1171

What we would like you to do is to find a topic from what we have covered in this week's readings that you are interested in and search the internet for material on that topic. You might, for example, find people who are doing research on the topic, you might find web pages that discuss the topic, you might find youtube clips that demonstrates something related to the topic, etc. What you find and use is pretty much up to you at this point. But use at least 3 sources (only one video please and make sure it adds to the topic).
1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.
Kurt Lewin is my topic this week. It fits into the chapter because there is an entire section about him in our book. I’m interested in learning more about him because I found it interesting that he actually gave credit to the Gestalt Vision when doing his research. I haven’t seen much credit by other psychologists when it comes to using other research to further their own.
2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?
• Lewin’s life
• Spin off of Gestalt Vision
• Other accomplishments
3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.
Kurt Lewin was from a middle class Jewish family. He moved to Berlin where he studied medicine at University of Frieberg before he moved to University of Munich to study biology. He ended up with a doctoral degree from University of Berlin. Before he studied Gestalt psychology, he studied behaviorism. He contributed to psychology by expanding gestalt ideas. He took these theories and applied them to the human behavior. He was one of the first psychologists to test the behavior of humans which in turn influenced experimental, social, and personality psych. Because of his work with scientific methods, he is known as the father of modern social psych. He opened up huge amounts of research and allowed all different sorts of questionable fields.
4) Finally, at the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm
This article gave me insight on Lewin’s background. It told me where he was from, where he studied, and helped me to understand how he grew up. It helps relate his accomplishments based on how he developed.
http://muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/lewin.htm
This gave a simple timeline of his life. It makes it a little simpler to see his accomplishments throughout the lifespan. The article also talked slightly about the group dynamics as well as his theory.
http://psychology.jrank.org/pages/381/Kurt-Lewin.html
This article gave me more insight on how he got his accomplishments. It went into more detail about what he did within his life and how he made his accomplishments.
Next make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
• Lewin
• Gestalt Vision
• Behaviorism
• Human behavior
• Experimental, social, personality psychology
• Scientific method

The topic that I have chosen to type this essay on is action research. This relates to the chapter, because it is one of the areas that Kurt Lewin worked with a lot. Lewin was introduced in this chapter. He built off gestalt psychology, and became known as the father of modern social psychology. Action research fell under the category of his work with social psychology. The reason that I am interested in this, is because it is research that can help our society be better. The results they find from these experiments show a lot about our society, and can help people learn what can make our society a better place to live.

The three aspects that I want to talk about for this assignment are how action research came to be, what Lewin did with action research, and the action research process.

Before Lewin came to the United States, he lived in Berlin, Germany. This was around the time of World War I, when the governments between the two countries were far different. Our government here in the US used a democratic style, meaning we had freedoms to do the things we like to do. However, at this time in Germany, they were under an autocratic style of government, meaning they had someone of authority telling them what to do all the time basically. With Lewin experiencing both styles he began to run experiments on peoples responses to authority and work output. Specifically, he tested 5 person groups of boys age 10. One group was assigned to an autocratic leader, one was assigned to a democratic leader, and the last was assigned to a laissez-faire leader. The group of boys under the autocratic leader never had any input on what to do, didn't think for themselves, and just did what they were told. The group of boys that was under the laissez-faire leader didn't do anything, because the leader wasn't telling them to do anything, and they didn't have any instruction on what to get done. However, the group of boys that were under the democratic leader became more task-oriented, had better quality work, and motivated. This experiment can be applied to any group of people that is trying to work together to get something accomplished. Every group needs to have a leader and to work together, and be motivated to be successful, and Lewin's experiment helped show that a democratic style of leadership is a way to be successful. That is why our government uses this style, and so do many workplaces, and sports teams. Thus after this experiment, and others, action research came into play. Action research is applying psychological knowledge to the solution of social problems, and that is what many of Lewin's experiments did.

Like I kind of hinted at in the previous paragraph, once Lewin saw that his experiments could help the society, He began to apply his research to a couple different settings to try to improve output. One of the places he used his action research was in workplaces of big companies. He had the workers at a company set production goals for themselves. This gave the workers a little bit of say in what they wanted to do and get accomplished. Not only did the workers work to complete their goals, but it also increased morale, and worker output. Lewin had found a way to get people motivated to want to do well in their job, which ultimately helps out companies production. After being successful with this, Lewin founded the Research center for Group Dynamics, affiliated with MIT. This was a place where him and his colleagues could figure out how to build good dynamics between people to better the output of the group as a whole. Also, Lewin helped establish the CCI, which was the Commission on Community Interrelations, which was centered in New York City. At this place Lewin and his colleagues researched on how to get rid of discrimination, racism, and prejudice. Lewin devoted his life to working with these two research groups, and was very successful in doing so. These experiments helped to better our society and get us to where we want to be as a society.

The last thing that I will talk about in this essay is the action research process. Action research is something that is necessary to do. Many people question the correlation between two subjects of psychological experiments a lot. In other words, some people just don't buy the research we do as factual. Action research on the other had is something that people can look at the statistics and see that it works. If a company is struggling with dynamics, and somebody were to come in and talk about how to get people to work together and improve the motivation of the employees, one could physically see the improvements the company is making. This also applies to any situation where action research can be used. There is three steps to the action research process. The first step is LOOK. This is when one would build a picture and gather information. Researchers would look for the problem, and at what setting the problem is occurring. They also would describe what all the participants have been doing up to this point. The next step is THINK. This is where we interpret and explain. We evaluate what people have been doing, and look at where we saw strengths, and where we may have saw some deficiencies. The last step is ACT. This is where we resolve the issues and problems. We look at those deficiencies and see how heavily they impact performance or work output, and work to find solutions to those problems. Finding these solutions will overall improve performance, or work output, and make the group better as a whole.

http://infed.org/mobi/kurt-lewin-groups-experiential-learning-and-action-research/
This website told me about some of the experiments, and what Lewin did to become famous in social psychology and action research

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_research
This website helped me get a broad understanding of what action research is and how it is used to improve our society as a whole.

http://infed.org/mobi/action-research/
This website gave me the 3 steps to action research.

Terms: Kurt Lewin, Social Psychology, Gestalt Psychology, autocratic, democratic, laissez-faire, MIT, CCI, research center for group dynamics.

1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.
-My topic is about Kurt Lewin and mainly on how he was a social psychologist and the Zeigarnik effect. It fits into the chapter since this chapter is about Gestalt psychology and he was the main one in this chapter that expanded on the Gestalt vision. I was interested in this topic since I think experiments are the best part of psychology. I like to read about more interesting experiments, and thought that the Zeigarnik effect was unique since I too wondered how waiters could remember orders without writing them down. I also have taken leadership training classes, so I also thought that his leadership research was an interesting read. It is always interesting to research different personality types and leadership types.

2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?
-My first aspect is about his biography that explains background information of how he became the man he is infamous for today. My second aspect is over the Zeigarnik effect. The last aspect is over his leadership research experiment.

3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.

-Kurt Lewin earned his doctorate from the University of Berlin and his mentor was Carl Stumpf. Since he is a German, he enlisted in the army during WW I, and after the war ended he returned to Berlin’s Psychological Institute where he became an instructor there. While he was there for over a decade, he developed his ideas and research program, attracted talented graduate students, and established an international reputation. He befriended other Gestalt psychologists like Wertheimer, Kohler, and Koffka. Unfortunately he was a Jew at the time of WWII, so he had to escape to the U.S. Fortunately he was well known in the U.S. What is interesting is that he even moved him and his family to Iowa! There he did research on child development. He died though of a heart attack but his research lives on. Some of his well-known research is the Zeigarnik effect. Lewin often met with his students in a cafe across the street from the University of Berlin. The custom there was that orders were not written down. The waiter or waitress kept them in their head and added additional items to them as they were ordered until the customers left. Lewin noted something quite interesting: The servers had an almost perfect memory for items that had been ordered until the bill was paid, and then a couple of minutes later could hardly recall anything about what was ordered. His student Bluma Zeigarnik carried out an experimental study of this phenomenon, finding that it had widespread validity, and it became known as the Zeigarnik effect. This ties in with his field theory since the waiter’s life space had tension in it. Once the bill gets paid, then the tension dissipates, so then closure is achieved and equilibrium is restored. His other well-known research covers leadership styles. He studied three different leadership styles, they are those who were authoritarians, democratic, and laissez-faire. It tested for five-person groups and how they were influenced by each of the different leadership styles. When a leader as autocratic, the boys quickly became submissive and less creative. They also failed to take any initiative, they did not produce high quality products, and showed little interest in their tasks. When the leader was out of the room, they also became more aggressive and bullied other group members. Those in the laissez-faire group weren’t that much of an improvement either. They did not have structure, so they were spending too much time trying to be decisive. They had no direction, so they were confused, frustrated, and hostile. Nothing was accomplished by this form of leadership style. The best form of leadership resulted as a democratic style. The group worked together and were task-oriented and motivated. Their products had more quality and quantity. What is more fascinating to me is that if a group switched from authoritarian to democratic setting, they had a difficult time overcoming being told what to do. What also is unique, is that when they switched from democratic to authoritarian environment, they quickly became submissive under the tyrant. Lewin’s research helped him expand on Gestalt psychology and made him famous even to today.

4)
-http://www.browsebiography.com/bio-kurt_lewin.html- I chose this site since it seemed to be credible, and it helped with my understanding of my aspects, mainly over his biography.
-http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/mkyang/O/psyc/lewin.html- I chose this site since it is credible, and it builds on from the text about my second aspect of the Zeigarnik effect.
-http://www.businessmate.org/Article.php?ArtikelId=31- I chose this site since it seemed to be pretty credible, and it built on from the text over how he was a social psychologist and his leadership styles which is my third aspect.

Terms- Kurt Lewin, Gestalt, Zeigarnik effect, social psychology, Carl Stumpf, Wertheimer, Kohler, Koffka, field theory, closure, equilibrium, life space

1) For this assignment, I chose to do more research on Kurt Lewin. He was a Gestalt psychologist which is why he is discussed in this particular chapter. Lewin was a very accomplished psychologist, responsible for many of our modern theories and ideas in psychology today.
2) Three aspects of this topic I would like to discuss is Lewin’s background and how he ended up in the United States, his most influential and controversial discoveries, and what impact he had on modern psychology.
3) Kurt Lewin was born in Prussia in 1890, what is now part of Poland, to a middle-class family. He entered college when he was 19 to study medicine, but switched to biology and eventually earned his PhD. In the middle of his academic studies, he joined the German army but was injured shortly after so he fairly quickly returned to his studies. He started his lecturing career at the Psychological Institute of the University of Berlin but was invited to Stanford University as a guest lecturer in 1930. As Hitler began his rise to power, Lewin decided it was best to permanently move his family to the United States. He ended up at Cornell, then moved to the University of Iowa, and eventually finished up at MIT.
Lewin was a Gestalt Psychologist and emphasized the importance of theories. However, he also thought that these important theories should be able to be applied to the real-world. One of his most notable contributions would be his Field Theory which he believed was an understanding of behavior required knowing all the forces acting on a person at a particular time. This had a big impact on social psychology because of the interaction between a person and their environment. He also came up with an equation for this concept, B= f(P,E). Lewin was also able to expand on many other Gestalt theories and apply them to social behavior, but is also known for his contributions to leadership and management climates. Working with school children, Lewin tested his three leadership styles; Authoritarian, Democratic, and Laissez-faire. His research ignited a great deal of other research into these leadership styles and their effectiveness.
Lewin also developed the idea of “action research” which has a large impact on modern research. Action research is mainly used in educational settings to improve on problems associated with the people, teaching strategies, or environment of the educational setting. His theories and ideas not only have a huge impact on modern psychology and how we conduct research, but he also had an impact on the study of individual human behavior and behavior in group settings. That’s why I feel that it is important to learn about Lewin and his theories to understand the history of psychology.
4) Sources:
http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm
I chose this site because it gave a good general overview of Lewin and his contributions. I used this source as a starting point when writing this assignment.
http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/Lewin.html
I chose this source because it went into more detail explaining his main contributions and findings during his career. I was able to use this site as a way to understand his theories and contributions, and how they impacted psychology today.
http://www.goodtherapy.org/famous-psychologists/kurt-lewin.html
This site was chosen because it gave another general overview of Lewin and his contributions, but it went into just a little more detail. It provided some additional information that was not found on the other sites or in the textbook.

Terminology: Kurt Lewin, Gestalt psychology, Field Theory, Authoritarian, Democratic, Laissez-faire, action research, human behavior.

1)the topic that I chose for my blog this week is Kurt Lewin. he was a Gestalt psychologist and Gestalt psychology was a major topic in the chapter for this week. Lewin had many accomplishments as a psychologist and was an influence in many ideas that we have today. this is why I chose him for my blog.
2/3) Lewin was born on September 9, 1890 in Prussia. at the age of 15 he moved to Berlin to attend the Gymnasium. he later enrolled at the university of Frieberg to study medicine before transferring to the University of Munich to study biology. his career as a student eventually ended with the completion of a doctorate degree from the university of berlin. when he began studying he originally was interested in the concept of behaviorism but he later became interested in Gestalt psychology. in 1914 he volunteered in the German army where he was injured in combat. I note this because it played a role later in his life with his with his developments in his field of theory and his study of group dynamics. in 1921 he began lecturing on philosophy and psychology at the Psychological Institute at the University of Berlin. his popularity among students and great writing ability there drew the attention of Stanford university who invited him to be a visiting professor in 1930. eventually he ended up emigrating to the united states where he took a teaching position at the university of Iowa where he worked until 1944. while he believed in the importance of theory he also believed that it needed to have a practical application so he began applying his research to the war effort working in the united states. he also established group dynamics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and National Training Laboratories.
in his career Lewin did many influential experiments and came up with many theories that we use today. one of these was on leadership styles and their effects. for this he performed an experiment with his colleagues L. Lippitt and R. White. for this the group did studies on three different leadership styles and what their effect was on boys activity groups in Iowa. the three styles were autocratic, democratic, and laissez-faire. it was found that with an autocratic leader the boys were dissatisfied and became more aggressive. in the democratic group there was more cooperation and enjoyment, and in the laissez-faire group showed no dissatisfaction but also were not very productive. when leaders were asked to change their styles the different styles kept having the same results. this experiment was important to him because he wanted to prove that democratic leadership was the best type. the study suggested overall that democratic style was the best and showed that with proper training and management that democratic leadership leads to the best results.
Another accomplishment of his was the Force Field Analysis. his force field theory viewed people's activity as being affected by forces in their surrounding area. three of the main principles of the theory are that 1) behavior is a function of the existing field 2) analysis starts from the complete situation and distinguishes its component parts and 3)a concrete person in a concrete situation can be mathematically represented. this analysis can help to decide whether certain forces in an organization are driving forces for change or if they are restrictive forces that work against change. the interaction of these forces according to Lewin create a stable routine of normal activities which he refers to as quasistationary processes. essentially this analysis has great use for organizations and shows that change only occurs if you push people out of their every day routines.
another achievement which I mentioned earlier was the development of the group decision making. after world war two he carried out research for the united states government for this he was supposed to explore ways of getting people to change their dietary habits to less popular cuts of meat. he found in this research that if group members were involved in and encouraged to discuss the issues and able to make their own decisions as a group that they were more likely to change their habits than if they had just been to a presentation that gave all of the proper information recopies and advise. out of the findings of this research he greatly influenced the field of group dynamics. in general there were two ideas that emerged they were that of interdependence of fate and task interdependence. Interdependence of fate shows that a group is made up of people with similarities and differences. each individual has different character. what comes out of this is by watching the group an individual will learn how much their fate depends on the fate of the entire group. task interdependence which essentially means that if a task is one where the group members depend on each other for achievement then the group dynamic is created.

4)http://psychology.about.com/od/profilesofmajorthinkers/p/bio_lewin.htm
from this site I got a lot of information about his early life and his career.
https://mbsportal.bl.uk/taster/subjareas/busmanhist/mgmtthinkers/lewin.aspx
from this site I got a couple more things about his career and got a few of his theories.
http://www.britannica.com/biography/Kurt-Lewin
on this site I also found information on some of his theories.

1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.
My topic for this week's blog is Max Wertheimer. Said to be one of the founders of Gestalt Psychology, he is very important to this chapter because frankly this chapter would either not exist or be drastically changed without him. I am interested in him because I enjoyed reading about some of the classroom experiments he held in this weeks text. He justified the idea that a lot of classrooms focus more-so on memorization instead of actual learning and cognitive growth. What really interests me is how this discovery was made quite some time ago and it seems as though this problem still exists today.
2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?
The three parts of Max Wertheimer I would like to discuss are: his biography, to hopefully shed some light on why he helped found Gestalt Psychology; some of his theories and experiments, to show what he thought and why he made certain conclusions; and his contribution to Gestalt Psychology, to explain how important he was to this new field.
3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.
Born in Prague in April of 1880, Max Wertheimer attended the University of Prague in 1898 and studied law until 1901. It was then when he became interested in psychology, physiology and philosophy and switched his studies to these three topics. I think these three topics combined are what really built Gestalt Psychology. He later worked with other psychologists such as Wolfgang Kohler and Kurt Koffka to develop the main ideas of Gestalt Theory. He later moved to America where he worked in productive thinking and later died.
One of Max Wertheimer's main interests was problem solving. This seemed to be the basis for most of his experiments. He took an unusual approach to looking at things by looking at the whole picture rather than it's detailed parts. Instead of looking at the individual train cars too understand them, he would examine the train. His first experiment was with flashing lights and apparent motion or as he later called it, the phi phenomenon. This was explained by the eye moving with the lights. This showed that the quality of a whole thing is not equal to the sum of its parts. Another experiment involved him going into a classroom and drawing a parallelogram and asking the students to find the area. He gave half of the students the formula of how to find it and let the other half try and figure it out on their own from what they knew about finding the area of other rectangles and shapes. The latter group had to use what was discovered to be called insight. When given similar problems he found that the children who had used insight before were better at solving these new problems than those who had just received the formula.
Being one of the founders, Wertheimer had a huge impact and many contributions to Gestalt Psychology. He noted the moving light or “apparent motion” that started the whole movement. He also found many of things that happen with our perception and called this grouping. There were four Laws of Organization, proximity, similarity, closure and simplicity. Gestalt psychology dealt with more than just perception though. These laws could be applied to memory and dreams for instance. When we explain a dream, we sometimes change the dream so it seems to make more sense to the person being explained the dream. He also wrote his most famous book Productive Thinking. This is in contrast to reproductive thinking where something is recalled or remembered, for example the students finding the area of a parallelogram using a memorized formula. Insight is needed to have productive thinking. An example of this would be if a dog were placed at the opening of a u-shaped barrier facing the inside of the “u” where at the base there would be a small opening with a treat visible. However the hole is too small for the dog to put their head through which leaves the treat out of reach. The solution would be for the dog to have to go around the box, involving first distancing himself from the treat to achieve it. This is an example of insight, or changing the viewpoint to solve a problem.
4) Finally, at the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.
http://www.lifecircles-inc.com/Learningtheories/gestalt/wertheimer.html
This website was very useful in giving the main ideas without going into a lot of detail to give an easier understanding of the ideas.
http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/gestalt.html
This website was very useul in understanding the ideas and concepts of Gestalt Psychology. Breaking down each of the laws and how they work. Some even with pictures!
http://gestalttheory.net/archive/wert1.html
This website was similar to the textbook where it was useful in giving a lot of information in detail. This made it easier to expand on some of my ideas.
Next make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Max Wertheimer, Gestalt Psychology, insight, cognitive growth, Wolfgang Kohler, Kurt Koffka, Gestalt Theory, phi phenomenon, apparent motion, laws of organization, productive thinking.

1. As we know, Gestalt psychology is not the most popular form of psychology, it is not used as often as other types, but is still important to know. There were three important men who discovered and contributed to Gestalt psychology, but I will only discuss one. Wolfgang Kohler was one of the founders of Gestalt psychology, and an important person to know because his research studies and experiments offered findings of cognition, which is important for psychology in general. Chapter nine is all about Gestalt psychology. Who came up with it, who contributed to it, and what the outcomes of the studies were. I thought that Kohler and his research with apes would be a good topic to discuss because it deals with cognition and problem solving which is indeed Gestalt psychology. I am interested in this topic particularly because apes are the most well-known species that are most alike to humans, and because of Kohler’s studies on apes, progress was made about the problem solving process for humans.

2. There are three different aspects of Kohler and his research I would like to discuss. First, I want to talk about Kohler and his early life. I think it is important to know where he came from and how he started his ideas of psychology and particularly Gestalt psychology. The second topic I will discuss is the fact that he was accused of being a German spy while doing his work with the apes. This is very interesting and important to note. We do not know why he was accused and if he really was a spy. The mystery intrigues me and I want to know more about this, if it is true or not. Lastly, I would like to discuss Kohler’s research and experiments with the apes in Tenerife. This study did much for psychology in general dealing with cognition and problem solving.

3. Wolfgang Kohler was Kurt Koffa’s partner in discovering Gestalt psychology. Max Wertheimer was also a founder, and Koffa and Kohler took after him. Kohler promoted his Gestalist ideas and by doing this it made him the most well-known of the three, and he was considered the best. In 1913, Kohler was given the opportunity to go to Tenerife, which was a primate colony. This is where he performed his experiments and had done his research with apes that is so well known. Kohler questioned Edward Thorndike’s theory that animals or humans learn from trial and error. Kohler believed that this was not the case, and that they learned from insight.

As we learned in this chapter Kohler is accused of being a German spy during World War 1 when he was supposedly doing his work with chimpanzees/apes. A book was even written about the accusation on whether or not he indeed commit espionage. The book called A Whisper of Espionage: Wolfgang Kohler and the Apes of Tenerife, was written by Ronald Ley who was also a psychologist. Ley went to Tenerife to locate Kohler’s site of research but instead ran into a native who stated that Kohler was in fact a German Spy. This intrigued him and caused him to take interest in the idea and further research it. We do not really know the facts about whether or not Kohler was a spy, but it is an interesting accusation to note. Maybe if he was actually a spy, and he got caught, maybe he would have never contributed what he did to Gestalt psychology. We may never know the truth, but the mystery is very intriguing.

Lastly I would like to discuss Kohler’s research and finding with his apes in Tenerife. As I noted earlier, Kohler believed these apes learned from insight, and not by Thorndike’s theory of trial and error. Kohler performed one particularly well-known experiment with an ape that dealt with problem solving. Called the “two stick experiment”, available to the apes were two different sized bamboo sticks, and just out of their reach was a banana. The ape had to figure out how reach the banana using these two sticks. Kohler’s findings were that the ape did in fact figure out how to reach the banana after carelessly playing with the two bamboo sticks. He also found that this problem solving process took a lot longer than if a human were given the task. So in conclusion, Kohler’s theory of insight was relevant to this experiment. The solution to the problem occurred quickly once it came to mind.

4. www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psychweb/history/kohler.htm
This website was very helpful because it provided a detailed biography of Wolfgang Kohler. It included all of his work and contributions.

https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ronals-ley/-a-whisper-of-espionage-wolfgang-kohler-and-the-/
This was an online book review of the book written about Kohler and the accusation of him being a German spy. It was really helpful to know what people’s opinions were on whether or not this accusation was true.

www.pigeon.psy.tufts.edu/psych26/kohler.htm
This website was very helpful to me in writing this blog because it not only discussed Kohler’s famous stick experiment, but it also included other experiments he has done to contribute to Gestalt psychology.

5. Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffa, Wolfgang Kohler, Insight, Edward Thorndike, Trial and Error Learning, Gestalt Psychology

This week I chose to do further research on Kurt Lewin and his contributions to the field of psychology. He was one of the main focuses of the chapter on gestalt psychology as he brought the ideas associated with gestalt theories to areas beyond perception. His field theory was heavily discussed as were his contributions to developmental and social psychology. In my research I sought to look further into his background as I found this rather intriguing in my initial reading. Additionally, I wanted to look into more of Lewin’s work in the realm of social psychology which was just briefly mentioned in the text.

When completing research one of the first areas often investigated is the background or biography of an individual. This can be helpful as it then becomes possible to get an overall picture of one’s life instead of just a snapshot of a few of their key contributions. It also allows for one to get to know the person outside of their work, research in this case, and to see them as a human being, too. So, this is where we start with Kurt Lewin. He was born in Moglino, a Prussian province which is today part of Poland, in 1890. His family came from humble beginnings and owned a general store and small farm outside of town. When he was 15, Lewin found himself in Berlin. After completing his initial education, Lewin went to college where he began by studying medicine and then biology. It was not until pursuing his doctorate that his focus switched to philosophy and psychology. He attended the University of Berlin, studying under Carl Stumpf, and eventually earned his degree in psychology. He, like many of his contemporaries, was affected by the Hitler regime and spent four years fighting in WWI. Lewin taught for some time at the University of Berlin and was known for his laid back form of teaching as he often held class in a café across the street where the famous Zeigarnik Effect was developed. In 1929, Lewin was invited to speak at a meeting of the International Congress at Yale which would result in an offer to then teach at Stanford for six months. It was shortly after his time at Stanford, that Lewin was forced to move to the United States for good as a result of Hitler’s rule. From there he spent two years at Cornell and another nine at none other than the University of Iowa. During his time in Iowa City, Lewin was also a guest at Harvard, became a naturalized citizen, and helped with U.S. mobilization in WWII. Throughout his lifetime, Lewin was married twice and had a total of three children. He died unexpectedly in 1947 from a heart attack. Looking back on his life, it is not hard to see that Lewin was a busy man. His tendency to travel and take up positions at several universities throughout Europe and the United States quite likely played a role in his popularity and ability to expand gestalt theories to so many different areas and people. I would like to discuss two of his works, the change model and group dynamics next.

One of Lewin’s contributions to the field of psychology, especially industrial psychology, was that of the change model. In this model, he developed three stages of change as they relate to an individual and a greater whole such as a company. The first stage is known as “unfreeze.” As people adjust to their environments, they develop a sense of identity and control which they would prefer not change. Thus, the idea of changing their environment often brings discomfort, anxiety, and fear. To get people to change, they must first “unfreeze” their mindset which wants to avoid change and in turn become ready for a change. The process of “unfreezing” takes time and this time differs from one individual to another. Often to make someone ready for change, they must be forced into it, such as in the case of a business decision, as opposed to letting them make the change on their own. Lewin’s second stage of change was transition, that is, making the actual change. Lewin saw this stage not as a single step but as a journey which often takes considerable time. This journey may include counseling or coaching and is not often easy. As mentioned, change removes us from our once comfortable environment into one which we do not know what to expect. Often the first step in this journey is the hardest, but with the help of others who are kind and sensitive it can be achieved. The final step is to then “refreeze” one’s mind. In other words, once the change has been completed it is time to become comfortable in this new environment. This step is important for an individual or company. If one sees just another change coming, they may see no reason to settle down in this environment which results in inefficient and ineffective work. One can clearly see this applied to the workplace but it can also be applied to our everyday lives. For example, if a child has moved many times in the course of their lives, they may see no reason to continue to get comfortable in their environment. They may not see a reason to make friends, work hard at school, or adjust to a new house or neighborhood if another move is going to displace them soon enough. Thus, the final stage can get complicated and have adverse effects on the individual and business.

Another focus of Lewin’s, as the founder of social psychology, was group dynamics. Lewin was a huge proponent of action research which was the use of psychological research to affect social change. It was because of this vision that Lewin established the Research Center on Group Dynamics at MIT where psychological research could be performed such that it could then be applied to the real world to make actual social change. The Research Center had several goals including the study of group productivity, communication, social perception, intergroup relations, group membership, and the training of leaders. All of these research areas sought to better understand how exactly a group works and how that can help create changes which improve society. One example of this work was research into gang behavior. Lewin discovered that in a certain incident which might have been termed a hate crime was in fact fueled by general hostility. He ascertained that if society could improve the lives of those in gangs (better housing, transportation, recreational facilities) then gang violence would in turn decrease. Additionally, Lewin was a large believer in the fact that prejudice caused discrimination and advocated that colleges admit individuals on the basis of intelligence instead of race or religion as it was prejudice against certain groups leading to such discrimination in education. Finally, Lewin’s Research Center worked on a project with negro sales personnel in various stores. At the time, many stores did not want to hire these individuals because they thought that sales would go down, however, Lewin’s study disproved these claims. Thus, Lewin looked further into the group dynamics of gangs and the presence of prejudice within groups as he sought to improve society.

Overall, Lewin had an impact on many different areas of psychology. He was able to bring gestalt theories into various different areas and truly impact a great variety of people even if his name isn’t the most well-known of psychologists of the past. His theories continue to live on well past his premature death and are important to consider when looking at the “whole” of psychology.

http://faculty.frostburg.edu/mbradley/psyography/lewin.html
From this website, I was able to get a general overview of Kurt Lewin’s life and contributions.

http://changingminds.org/disciplines/change_management/lewin_change/lewin_change.htm
This website provided me with great information on the three stages of change theory.

http://muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/lewin.htm
I was able to gain valuable insight into Lewin’s work on group dynamics and supplemental information on his background from this website.

Terminology: Kurt Lewin, gestalt psychology, field theory, social psychology, Carl Stumpf, Zeigarnik Effect, industrial psychology, change model, group dynamics, action research

“The world is such a small place.” This is a quote that I have heard and said many times. For example, I was in Virginia Beach, Virginia wearing an Iowa Hawkeye tee shirt. A man comes up to me and says, “Are you from Iowa?” I explained to him that I was born and raised there. He goes on to explain that he, too, was born and raised in small town Iowa, but moved out to Virginia after joining the Army. Also while living in Virginia, I worked with a personal training company. One of the co-owner’s best friends was the Iowa State men’s basketball coach. On both occasions, I thought to myself “What a small world!” While reading this chapter, I found it interesting that Kurt Lewin and his family moved to Iowa where he worked closely with the University of Iowa to study the development of normal children and help train child development researchers. I thought to myself, “Wow, why would someone come to Iowa. It’s such a small place and such a small world to think this famous psychologist came to my home state.” After further reading about Lewin, I found out that he completely fit the model of this chapter, but with a twist. Lewin wasn’t a proponent of gestalt, but he practiced many of the same ideals. However, he applied it in different topic areas. I wanted to learn more about Lewin’s twist on Gestalt psychology. So for this week’s blog, I chose this week is Kurt Lewin; more specifically, his action research, his theory of field study, and his work with the Child Welfare Research Station.
Kurt Lewin said, “The research needed for social practice can best be characterized as research for social management or social engineering. It is a type of action-research, a comparative research on the conditions and effects of various forms of social action, and research leading to social action. Research that produces nothing but books will not suffice.” What Lewin was referring to in this quote was one of his largest concerns as a psychologist. He was concerned with social problems of group processes. Lewin wanted to for address conflict, crises, and change within organizations. He believed that a group of people could work together to identify a problem, work together to resolve it, review their work and see if the effort was successful, and if it is not, they would try again. This ideology, he termed as action research. The action research approach involves a series of steps. Each one of the steps is composed of a loop of planning, action, and fact-finding about the result of the action. The basic loop involves the following: 1. Identifying a general idea, 2. reconnaissance, 3. planning, 4. taking the first action step, 5. evaluating, 6. amending the plan, 7. taking the second action step… and so on. According to Lewin, action research will not work unless active participation by all in the group carry out the research together and work together to exploration the problem. After investigating the problem, the group would make a decision. Regular reviews are a must. This action research can be applied to many different large corporations and groupings. It is important contribution because it gave large groups of people a way to work together to problem-solve.
“To understand or to predict behavior, the person and his environment have to be considered as one constellation of interdependent factors,” a quote from Lewin. By this, Lewin was referring to predicting the behavior of others from a client and doctor perspective. As a doctor, Lewin would view the field of an individual client. Our field is, the surroundings and conditions, depend on other people. Our “field” is all aspect (a) of an individual’s relationship with their surroundings and conditions that influence the behaviors (b) and developments of concern (c) at a particular point in time. Lewin used his idea of field to create his field theory, which states that analysis by the doctor starts with the situation as a whole. Doctors need to avoid offering pre-determined solutions. Instead, doctors need to take the time and effort to study the characteristics of each situation and make an illustration of the forces being experienced by clients. By analyzing the field of people and their environment as one, we can see the patterns that are helping or hindering a goal.
Lewin was at Stanford and Cornell before joining the Child Welfare Research Station at the University of Iowa as professor of child psychology. At the University of Iowa, Lewin and his associates conducted research on the effect of democratic, autocratic, and laissez-faire methods of leadership upon the other members of groups. Using controlled experiments with groups of children, Lewin maintained that contrary to popular belief, the democratic leader has no less power than the autocratic leader and that the characters and personalities of those who are led are profoundly affected by a change in social atmosphere. In carrying out such changes on human behavior patterns, Lewin argued, the democratic group that has long-range planning surpasses both the autocratic and laissez-faire groups in creative initiative and sociality. As a general rule, the more democratic the procedures are, the less resistance there is to change. If someone would want to turn his group into a democratic one, their ideology, the character of members, and the locus of power within the group must be looked at. He also warns that democratic behavior cannot be learned by autocratic methods. The members of the group must at least feel that the procedures are "democratic."

http://infed.org/mobi/kurt-lewin-groups-experiential-learning-and-action-research/ - I chose this website because it had a good visual of the action research and I was better able to understand the idea. I used this information to build on what I read in the chapter.
http://www.tavinstitute.org/projects/field-theory-rule/ - I chose this website because it was solely about the field theory, therefore it was easier to weed out the important information. I used the information from this website to build on what I read on the chapter. I used the information to add depth into what I read.
http://psychology.jrank.org/pages/381/Kurt-Lewin.html - I chose this website because it had a pretty good amount of information about Lewin’s involvement at the University of Iowa and the Child Welfare Research Station. I used a lot of this information to learn about his works here in Iowa.
Terms and Terminology: Kurt Lewin, action-research, field, field theory, Child Welfare Research Station

1) The topic I decided to do more research on this week was the Bluma Zeigarnik. I decided to pick this topic for this week because it really interested me. Kurt Lewin was a big part of the chapter we read with his ideas and contributions to psychology and I liked how a female contributed an idea so big during that time. I liked how the little bit of information from the book about her was interesting but I want to know more about the Zeigarnik effect and what other contributions she made to psychology.

2) For this assignment, the three aspects of the Bluma Zeigarnik I am going to talk about are who she is, what the Zeigarnik effect is, and what other contributions to psychology she has made.

3) Bluma Zeigarnik was born in 1901 and grew up in a time where women were discriminated against leading up to World War II. Even with that discrimination going against her, she ended up being one of the first women in Russia to attend a university. She got into studying psychology because she had very notable professors that had taught her like Kurt Lewin, Wolfgang Köhler, and Max Wertheimer. She got really into Gestalt psychology that Lewin researched. Eventually, she took enough of an interest in psychology to get into Lewin’s research group. In Lewin’s research group is when she discovered her main, most known contribution to psychology; the Zeigarnik effect.

The Zeigarnik effect is that when people are able to recall more information of uncompleted or interrupted tasks compared to tasks that were completed. Bluma got this idea from watching a waiter. She was watching her waiter and realized that once people paid he couldn’t remember but he always knew which of his customers had not paid yet. The reason this happens is because of our automatic system. Our automatic system signals the conscious mind that an activity was left incomplete. In a way it is human nature to finish what we start and we experience the feeling of incompleteness and anxiety if it is not done. As humans our memory and cognitive thinking is great. We constantly think about different tasks and decipher which ones are important enough to go after. When something is completed it no longer has to be on the front of our memory compared to tasks that aren’t done are at the front of our memory. Our perceptions change depending on that situation.

Even though Bluma is most known for her Zeigarnik effect she also has had other contributions to psychology. She worked as a scientist in Germany for awhile but she had problems publishing material due to the fact she was a girl. She started working in different psychological institutions but eventually had to move home because of the fact World War II was starting and she was Jewish. While back in Moscow she helped found the Department of Psychology at Moscow State University. She would lecture around different about her research in psychology.

4) http://www.digplanet.com/wiki/Bluma_Zeigarnik - I chose this URL because it has information about what the Zeigarnik effect is, but it also has information about Bluma Zeigarnik’s life.
http://www.psychwiki.com/wiki/Zeigarnik_Effect - I chose this URL because it helped me learn more information about what the effect is and how it has contributed to modern psychology.
http://www.feministvoices.com/bluma-zeigarnik/ - I chose this URL because it had information about what Bluma’s life was like, some of the Zeigarnik effect, and some other contributions she had made to psychology.

Terms: Zeigarnik effect, Kurt Lewin, Bluma Zeigarnik, automatic system, Wolfgang Köhler, Max Wertheimer, Gestalt psychology, psychology, cognitive learning, perception

1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.
I decided to do farther research on the Bluma Zeigarnik and the Zeigarnik effect. This relates to the chapter because it is one of the studies that Lewin and his student (Bluma Zeigarnik) did about an observation they made while at a café about how a waiter would know their orders without writing anything down, and then forget what each person ordered after the bill was settled and the tension was released. The Zeigarnik effect shows that people remember better when they have been interrupted as opposed to uninterrupted tasks. I think that the concept is fascinating. I also think that it is cool how she was a woman who discovered this and it cool to see us women being represented in a positive light. This effect is related to Gestalt psychology

2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?
I would like to know who Bluma was and
3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.
Bluma Zeigarnik was born in Lithuania in 1901. In 1916 she skipped the first four grades, she enrolled in fifth grade at a girls’ gymnasium in Minsk. Bluma graduated the 7th grade in 1918 with a gold medal. She wanted to go on to continue her education but the school that were available for girls did not have a wide variety of subjects. She met her husband at the library and even though her parents weren’t too excited with her choice in husband at first, but they actually paid for the two of them to move to Europe to get an education. Zeigarnik began studying psychology under the influence of Lewin, Kohler, and Wertheimer. In her first study with Lewin she found that tasks that are interrupted are remembered by adults approximately 90% better than those that are fully completed, and that children, in general, remember only interrupted tasks which is now known as the Zeigarnik Effect. This is a phenomenon that occurs when individuals remember tasks that were left uncompleted or have been interrupted, more often than the tasks that were completed.

She first noticed this while she was studying waiters and waitresses in a restaurant. She observed that they could remember incomplete orders or interrupted tasks better than completed tasks. She began studying this and realized that when a task is completed, people put it out of their minds and do not try to remember it anymore.

The Zeigarnik Effect can be very useful when it comes to advertising because in advertising, they leave people hanging on by not telling them everything, which hopefully make them want to know more and remember it more. The Zeigarnik Effect is also used in headlines. When you read a headline that compels you and you want to read more that is the Zeigarnik Effect.
This thought has produced the successful productivity technique called the Pomodoro technique which revolves around sections of time that are meant to be high-intensity focus time slots with small five-minute breaks in between where the individual switches his attention over to allow his mind to reset and accommodate, while also preserving some of the task-specific pressure, and then returning to the working timeslot. The Zeigarnik effect is also used popular storybook and even TV shows in the form of a cliffhanger. John Gottman, a relationship psychologist, applied the effect to relationships, and how after a couple reach an understanding of one another. But, if an argument is not settled in a proper way, the hurt feelings reappear over and over, and can cause an increase in negative attitudes towards one-another

When she attempted to recreate the experiment her results were weak in proving her theory. Lewin suggests that a task in action puts forth a "task-specific" tension on the individual which allows them to access cognitive abilities that are applicable to the task at hand. This tension is lost when the task is completed. This effect can apply to students and their studying, suggesting that students who take breaks and shift their focus toward an unrelated activity have higher memory recall than those who study in one session.

After graduation, she continued her education and obtained a PhD from the University of Berlin. She worked as a scientist in what is now known as the All-Union Institute of Experimental Medicine and she helped found Moscow University's Department of Psychology, taught, and lectured frequently.

4) http://kratovo.livejournal.com/10302.html
I liked this website because it gave me information about Bluma Zeigarnik as a person before her discovery of the Zeigarnik effect. It talks about her life and her education.
http://www.sophieslist.com/another-one-on-the-zeigarnik-effect/
I liked this webpage a lot because it talked about how the Zeigarnik Effect is used today. It was really interesting to learn the ways that it is used in advertising.
http://www.spring.org.uk/2011/02/the-zeigarnik-effect.php
I chose this website because it shows how the Zeigarnik effect is used within TV shows and books.

1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.

My topic of research is the phi phenomenon. It fits into chapter ten because the chapter discussed gestalt psychology, including apparent motion and phi phenomenon. I am interested in it because it is something we unconsciously experience on a daily basis.

2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?

1.The development of gestalt psychology and phi phenomenon

2.Experiments conducted to study the phi phenomenon

3.Relevance and examples of the phi phenomenon in the context of everyday life

3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.

Gestalt psychology is the set of ideas that support perceptual organization. In general, it is the idea that the whole of something is completely different than the sum of its parts. This development of this field of psychology started with Max Wertheimer, who bought a toy stroboscope from a train station. The toy alternated between two picture to make it seem like there was a motion happening. This sparked Wertheimer's interest in apparent motion, later to be called the phi phenomenon. In simple terms, the phi phenomenon is the perception of motion in sedentary objects.

Experiments conducted to further study this interest of Wertheimer's included the three flashing lights. One light was in the center of the field of study, one to the left, and one to the right. One light would flash at a time, but very little time would occur between flashes. The participants reported that they saw a continuous motion of light, moving from side to side. A similar study was done with two horizontal lines on a screen, one on the left, one on the right. One would appear and disappear. Then, milliseconds later, the second line would appear and disappear. Participants reported that they saw a line move across the screen, rather than seeing two separate lines flashing. This may be interesting, but is it relevant to our lives? Is it important?

The phi phenomenon occurs in our lives on a regular basis, whether we are aware of it or not. Cinema, motion pictures are a great example, a series of still images. Other examples include flip books, "spinning circles" on loading apple products, and various other images on televisions and computers. Again, this may be intriguing, but why is it important? Why do our minds perceive motion in sedentary objects? One idea is that evolution developed the human brain to quickly locate motion due to hunting animals and avoiding harm. Although that may no longer be relevant today, in our society, it contributes to understanding from where the phi phenomenon developed.

4) Finally, at the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.

http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/gestalt.html

This website was useful in its explanation of gestalt psychology and its several theories.

http://www.psychologynoteshq.com/phi-phenomenon-and-psychology/

This site was very useful in its discussion of the development of gestalt psychology and the phi phenomenon, including experiments.

http://www.psychologynoteshq.com/phi-phenomenon/

This site was useful in giving examples of the phi phenomenon. It opened up the question: Why do our minds perceive motion in sedentary objects?

Next make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.

Gestalt psychology
phi phenomenon
apparent motion
Max Wertheimer

1)Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.

The topic that I will be talking about is the principles of perceptual organization. This fits into the chapter because it is a part of Gestalt psychology and was briefly talked about in the chapter. This topic sparks my interest because I have always thought optical illusions are cool and the fact that we can change the way we see things by focusing on the background or foreground of a picture is really amazing.

2)What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?

I am going to talk about the figure ground principal, then I will talk about the ways proximity, similarity and closure are used in advertisement and then I will talk about how these illusions apply to some of our news stories today.

3)Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.

The gestalt organizing principles are an important part of Gestalt psychology as a whole. One of the more important principles, in my opinion, is the figure-ground principal. The basic idea of figure-ground is that there is a black figure placed on a white background. We perceive the black figure to be the main object of the picture and the white background is a continuation behind the black object (note that the colors can be reversed like a white figure on a black background). This is called figure assignment. One cool thing we can do when we see these pictures is to switch the figure assignment and make the white background become the figure and the black figure is now the background. The most common example of this is Edgar Rubin’s drawing of a goblet in white with the black background and the borders of the goblet being two faces.

The Gestalt principles are most commonly seen in advertisements. The most notorious example of the figure-ground concept being used in an advertisement is the Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium example found in our books on page 253 figure c. If you focus on the black part of the picture, you see a tree and some birds. If you focus on the white part of the picture, you can see a tiger (or lion) and a gorilla. Proximity is the way our brain can group things that are closer together. We like paragraphs in papers, magazines and flyers because it’s easier to read and looks nice. Similarity is when we group objects that look alike. Examples that make up some groups would be colors, shapes, and sizes. In the graphic design world, paragraphs and similar headings can be grouped together depending on placement. Probably the most used Gestalt principle is closure. This is when we unintentionally fill in the gaps of a figure with our imaginations. The best example of this would be the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Panda. The panda is not completely filled in but our brains can tell that it is a panda because we perceive the existing parts and fill in the blanks.

Another way that the Gestalt organization principles can be seen is when people talk about seeing faces or certain patterns in their food, on buildings and many other places. We tend to group images in our minds to something we find familiar if the image is not clear cut. This is called pragnanz, which is making what we perceive mirror what we have already experienced and is also the basic concept behind what is now known as the law of familiarity. One of the widest known phenomenon with this concept is the face on Mars story. There is a mountain on mars that looks like a face if a picture is taken right above it. The shadows play off of the different heights of the mountains peeks and makes it look like it has eyes, a nose, and a mouth. The reason we see it as a face is because we try to relate this image to what we see every day and that results in a face.

Gestalts organization principles have many more applications than the ones I wrote about but I thought these were the most relevant to present time. I think another practical application of these concepts would be the Rorschach inkblot tests. The main point I’m trying to get to is that without the discovery and hard work of the scientists who discovered how we perceive things, we wouldn’t have the knowledge about advertisements and we would possibly still be thinking that real faces were appearing on Mars.

4) Finally, at the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Figure-ground_perception

I used this site to get a deeper understanding of figure-ground perception and I used this to figure out how we decide what the figure is in a picture and why it is so hard to see the image flipped. I used this site probably second to most. I mainly needed it to understand what figure-ground really was.

http://www.howdesign.com/resources-education/online-design-courses-education/gestalt-theory-typography-design-principles/

I used this source to understand how the perceptual organization concepts fit into advertisements. I also used this site to find more examples of the concepts. It did give me a lot of insight about how graphic designers can use the Gestalt principals to make adds more eye catching and easier to read.

https://sites.psu.edu/psych256fa13/2013/09/13/gestalt-the-virgin-mary-and-men-on-mars/

I used this article to see how the Gestalt principals applied to the stories about people seeing faces in their food and the more known story about the face on Mars.

Terms: Principles of perceptual organization, figure-ground principal, proximity, similarity, closure, figure assignment, pragnanz, law of familiarity, Edgar Rubin.

1) My topic will be over the principles of perceptual organization. This chapter talked about the principles. It briefly discussed how the perceptions are seen in our minds and why. I’m interested in it because the perceptions are neat to look at. It’s really looking at why we perceive the things that we do and why.
2) One aspect I’d like to discuss is the principles in more depth. Another aspect I’d like to discuss is how we use them or how they applicable in real life. The last part of this topic I’ll discuss are the critics for these ideas.
3) The principles are law of proximity, similarity, closure, good continuation, symmetry, and simplicity. The law of proximity says that elements that are placed together tend to be seen as a group. Because they are within a certain distance of each other, these elements aren’t seen as independent objects. Law of similarity states that similar elements tend to be grouped in our minds. This can even overrule grouping due to how close they are. It’s just easier for our brains to group these similar items together. The law of closure claims that stimuli are grouped together and can be made into complete figures or images. Law of good continuation argues that elements are grouped together to minimize change. People perceive these as shapes or patterns. Law of symmetry states that things that are symmetrical are seen as a unified group. It’s like the law of simplicity. Law of simplicity is the law of pragnaz. It says that every element, object, stimuli is seen or perceived in it’s most simple form. It’s also the central law too Gestalt psychology.

4)
https://www.siggraph.org/education/materials/HyperVis/vision/percorg.htm
This gave a look at what the principles are. It gave really good examples of what there are and how they looked.
https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/book/the-glossary-of-human-computer-interaction/gestalt-principles-of-form-perception
This site gave wonderful examples of how these principles are used in real life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n46umYA_4dM
This video gave wonderful explanations

TERMS;
law of proximity
similarity
closure
good continuation
symmetry
simplicity
principles of perceptual organization
Gestalt psychology

1). My topical blog for week 10 is going to be about perceptual organization in Gestalt psychology. I think this topic is interesting and I would like to learn more about the laws and the topic in general. This builds in to the topic we learned about in the reading because it is a big part of Gestalt psychology and that is what the chapter is about in its entirety.

2). My topics that I am going to talk about are, what Gestalt psychology is and how perceptual organization builds into it, what perceptual organization is, and the laws of perceptual organization,

3). Gestalt psychology was founded by Wertheimer, Kohler, and Koffka, it focuses on how people interpret the world around them. Gestalt psychology branches off of structuralism in ways such as breaking down mental events and experiments. Wertheimer noticed this similarity and he created a phenomenon known as the phi phenomenon, which is seeing the events as rapid sequences or rows of flashing lights, they create illusions even when nothing is truly there. This is the concept that motion pictures are based off of. This type of psychology says that the whole is different than the sum of its parts. This then developed a group of principles to explain how smaller objects group to form larger ones, perceptual organization.
Perceptual organization like I mentioned before is the grouping of smaller objects to make a bigger one. Perceptual organization is basically saying that everything we see is the first time we have seen it because no exact situation presents itself twice, the same configurations with the same lighting, It has been agreed that there is a generic criteria within a scenes content other wise how would we be able to break down a scene without knowing what is in the scene before we break it down. This has largely to do with the visual field and how it works. There still attempting to find better laws regarding the visual system but for now we still use the list of six laws created in the 1920s and 1930s by Wertheimer and Koffka.
The Six laws or principles of Perceptual organization are law of proximity, law of similarity, law of closure, law of good continuation, law of symmetry, law of simplicity. The law of proximity is what explains why when things are close together they appear to us to be grouped together. The law of similarity explains that we see things that are similar and group them together. The law of closure says that objects grouped into a complete figure. The law of good continuation explains that we tend to see lines as smooth paths. The law of symmetry states that objects that are not connected but have symmetrical boarders are seen as coherent figures. Finally the law of Simplicity says that we see things in the simplest ways such as breaking down a complex shape into the easiest way for us to view like overlapping shapes are viewed as two different shapes overlapping not as one object.

4) Perceptual Organization, Gestalt psychology, laws of perceptual organization, law of proximity, law of similarity, law of closure, law of good continuation, law of symmetry, law of simplicity, structuralism, phi phenomenon

http://psychology.about.com/od/sensationandperception/ss/gestaltlaws.htm
I chose this webpage because I thought it was interesting and explained what gestalt psychology is and it related it to perceptual organization and that is how it helped me in this blog. It also helped with the each of the laws if you hit the show all tab at the bottom it lists all of the laws and It was helpful in that way as well.

http://wairimusensationndperception.weebly.com/gestalts-laws-of-perceptual-organization.html
I chose this webpage because it did a good job explaining each of the laws and helping me understand each one better. This helped me with the explanation of each of the laws.

https://www.siggraph.org/education/materials/HyperVis/vision/percorg.htm
This webpage really helped me talk about what perceptual organization is and also helped with the explanation of each law. This helped me with the last two parts of my blog with what perceptual organization is and the laws of organization,

1) Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter we have covered this week, and why you are interested in it.
The topic that I have chosen to research this week is behaviorism as a whole. This fits in with the chapter because John Watson is the father of behaviorism. Ever since I started taking psychology classes I have always been interested in behaviorism. I am very intrigued when learning the reasons why people emit the behaviors they do.

2) What are three aspects of the topic you want to talk about for this assignment?
I am going to talk about the two different types of behavioral conditioning, what exactly the behaviorist approach is, and some pros and cons of behaviorism.

3) Next, I would like you to take the information you found from the various sources and integrate/synthesize them into the three aspects of the topic, and then write about the topic.
The behaviorist approach is mainly concerned with behaviors that are observable, because these types of behaviors can be measured either scientifically or objectively. It does not really take into account those behaviors that are internal such as emotions or thinking processes. Behaviorists also believe that people do not really have free will, but rather that a person’s environment is what determines their behavior. It also believe that everyone is born with a mind that is comparable to a blank slate. This can also be referred to as tabula rasa. Behaviorism also plays a role in comparative psychology. It is not uncommon for behavior experiments to be tested on animals and then applied and compared to humans. In the simplest of terms, behavior can be broken down into just a stimulus followed by a response/consequence. The purpose of behavior is to predict the response or outcome once a person knows what the stimulus is.
There are two types of behavioral conditioning, they are operant and classical. Operant conditioning is is type of behavioral learning that uses reinforcements and punishments. As time goes by an association will be made between the stimulus and the response, for a certain behavior. After a behavior is emitted, if the response is pleasure then it is more likely for that behavior to occur more often. However, if the response that follows the emitted behavior is aversive then it is more likely for the behavior to not occur as frequently. Classical conditioning is used mostly in behavioral training. This is when a naturally occurring stimulus becomes paired the with a certain response. After this has happened, a previously neutral stimulus with also become paired with the naturally occurring stimulus. Over time the neutral stimulus will become the thing to cause the response without the naturally occurring stimulus. These two parts of the situation are more formally know as the conditioned stimulus and conditioned response.
Like everything else in this world behaviorism has both its pros and its cons. The pros are that since it is based on observable behaviors it is much easier to collect data. It can also be helpful in therapy or when working with children who have behavioral disorders. The cons of behaviorism are that it does not account for the other ways that people can learn when not using positive and negative reinforcement. It is also possible for people to change their behavior after they have been given new information, even if they have already established a set behavior because of reinforcement.

4) Finally, at the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. For each URL you have listed indicate why you chose the site and the extent to which it contributed to your post.

http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/f/behaviorism.htm -- This site gave me good information about classical and operant conditioning

http://www.simplypsychology.org/behaviorism.html -- This site gave me the information i need to talk about what behaviorism is

http://www.slideshare.net/sroushandel/behaviorism-12326955 --This site had good examples of pros and cons for behaviorism

Terms: behaviorism, John B. Watson, behavioral conditioning, classical conditioning, operant conditioning, behaviorist approach, observable, tabula rasa, comparative psychology, stimulus, response, reinforcement, punishment, conditioned stimulus, conditioned response