Wertheimer, Max - Theories In Action

Theories In Action

It is probable that Gestalt theory would have remained far more of an abstract notion with little application in everyday psychology had it been left to Max Wertheimer. Wertheimer possessed a restless, brilliant mind that was poorly suited to the day-to-day, more mundane task of making his ideas work in everyday life. In this way, he was far different from two of his contemporaries, Karen Horney and Carl Rogers. Both Horney and Rogers, throughout their careers, consistently saw patients and wrote books describing the application of their personality and therapy ideas. Wertheimer, on the other hand, threw out a brilliant theory to those around him, and then stood back and waited to see what they would do. Clearly the first two "catchers" of Wertheimer's ideas were his two laboratory assistants in Frankfurt in 1912, Wolfgang Köhler and Kurt Koffka.