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Research into Visual Perception conducted by Gottschaldt
From the mid-1920s to the early 1940s the influence of past experience
on human visual perception was a popular research area. Many investigators
employed arrangements of simple two-dimensional geometrical shapes, sometimes
alone and sometimes embedded in more complex forms.
A highly influential experimental study suggested by Wertheimer and
conducted by Gottschaldt was published (in German) in the mid
to late 1920s.
Gottschaldt used five simple geometrical figures
which he called
the ‘impression-series’, and thirty-one complex figures, the ‘test-series’.
One of the simple figures was contained in an inconspicuous part of each
of the complex figures. A group of three observers were shown each figure
in the
impression-series three times and asked to name and learn them. They were
then shown each figure in the test-series and asked to verbally describe
each. They
were not told that the impression figures were contained in the test figures.
A second group of (eight) observers followed the same procedure except that
this (second) group were shown each figure in the impression-series 520 times.
The observers’ experience was considered to vary with the number of
times the impression-figures alone had each been displayed. The effectiveness
of
the experience was measured by the number of times a figure in the test-series
was correctly described in terms of the impression-series figure contained
within it. Gottschaldt’s results indicated that the number of times
a simple figure had been shown had no effect on it being seen in a complex
figure.
These results were used to argue that the effect of experience is less significant
than the ‘belonging together’ of ‘natural wholes’.
It has therefore been used to justify the Gestalt argument that complete
forms, rather than the many individual sensations of colour and brightness
which result
from looking at them, are most important in determining the human perception
of the scene, or object, viewed.
This work has been cited, discussed, and often described, by many subsequent
authors including Braly.
This Section consists of short summaries of historial
research and theories into human visual perception of simple two-dimensional
objects (these are extracted and summarised from a Ph.D. Thesis [67]
dated 1996).
For more general information about the human visual system see
the sections about:
The
Eye; Parts
of Eye; Visual
Disorders;
Ophthalmological
Procedures. |
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This entry relates to studies of human visual perception conducted
and published during the 1920s.
This
Section is about
Theories
of Visual Perception.
To read about other theories and contributions of other researchers,
use the links on the left-hand side.
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