Republic of the Philippines

Laguna State Polytechnic University

Province of Laguna
AY 2018 – 2019

NAME: IJANE GUARTE BARRIENTOS

COURSE DESCRIPTION: PSYCHOLOGICAL AND SOCIOLOGICAL
FOUNDATION OF EDUCATION
TOPIC: COGNITIVE THEORIES
PROFESSOR: DR. L.PEREZ

COGNITIVE THEORIES
KOHLER’S INSIGHT THEORY- Kohler held that animals
and human beings are capable of seeing relationships
between objects and events and act accordingly to
achieve their ends.
 They have the power of looking into
relationships involved in a problem of looking relationships involved in a
problem and in coming up with an solution.
INSIGHT LEARNING THEORY- A solution to a problem presumably does
not involve trial-and-error learning.

Achieving an Insight Learning is illustrated in one of Kohler’s

experiments with a chimpanzee.
In a picture the chimpanzee got placed inside a cage. In a cage there are
two experiments. One chimpanzee with a two sticks with different lengths.
The other one experiment with a three boxes and a banana was
hanging at the ceiling.
GESTALT LAWS-This school psychology upon which most of cognitive
psychology is based was developed by Wolfgang Kohler, Marx Wertheimer,
and Kurt Koffka in 1921.
The primary focus was perception. This study led to the principle or
laws that govern how people assign meanings to visual stimuli.
5 LAWS OF GESTALT.
 LAW OF PROXIMITY- Elements that are placed close to each other
will often be perceived as one group.

This holds that things close together are grouped together in perception.
 LAW OF SIMILARITY- Objects that look alike,
with similar components or attributes, are more
likely to be organised together.
This laws refers to the perception of similar objects
that tend to be related.
 LAW OF CLOSURE- In perception there is the tendency to complete
unfinished objects. We tend to ignore gaps and complete contour
lines.

 LAW OF CONTINUITY- Objects will be grouped as a whole if they

are co-linear, or follow a
direction. In the image on
the left, we perceive a long
“line” created from the
lighter dots. On the other
 hand, the “line” created from the darker dots is perceived as
interrupted.
 LAW OF PRAGNANZ- Figures are seen as their
simple elements instead of complicated shapes.
This law came about as an overarching principle
of Gestalt psychology. Developed by by Koffka
(1933), it states that of all the possible
organizations that could be perceived from a
visual stimulus, the one that will ost likely occur
is the one that possess the best, simplest and most stable form.
LEWINS’ TOPOLOGICAL AND VECTOR THEORY (Field Theory)-
Another cognitivist is Kurt Lewin who came up with the view that focused on
the psychological field or life space of an individual.
Lewin’s basic premise is that for every objects exist in a “field space”
that move to change it, define it, or give it a degrees of stability and
substance.
In Lewin’s view, the ideas, expectations, feelings, arritudes, and
needs of the individual constitute the internal forces; while everythings in the
physical wolrd including other human beings.
Applied in teaching, Lewins’ theory points to the fact that to
understand the motivation of a particular learner, the teacher has to develop
the ability to transcend the tensions (needs) of the learners, the learner’s
abilities, and the properties of the learner’s perceived environment.
In a classroom, for instance, each individual child has his own
psychological field apart from the others; the teacher, therefore, must try to
suit the goals and activities of the lesson to the learner’s needs.
JEROME BRUNER’S THEORY OF LEARNING- Another cognituve theorist
is Jerome Bruner came up with his learning theory that focuses on the
problem of what people do with information to achieve generalized insights
or understanding. It involves;
1. Acquisition-the process of obtaining new information that can either
replace or refine something previously known.
2. Transformation- is the manipulation of information to fit news
situations
 3. Evaluation- is checking whether or not the learned material has been
manipulated approaritely.
INSTRUMENTAL CONCPETUALISM- Bruner’s learning theory that its
centralview is the nature of the knowing process. He points out that further
that if a learner is to use information effectiveky, it must be translated into
his terms. This means that the teacher must strive to see a problem as the
learner sees it and provide information that is consistent with the learner’s
perpective.
4 SIGNIFICANT CONCERNS APPLICABLE IN LEARNING SITTUATION
1. Understanding Relationships in the structure of the subject matter-
this involves the understanding relationships and knowledge
structure to one another.
2. Readiness- there is no need to defer instruction in certain subkects
until a child has reached the appropriate maturational level.
3. Development of the Independent Learner- the learner must be
permanently dependent on the teacher’s correction of his errors.
4. Motivation- he believes that instrinsic motivation means creating a
desire to learn a subject while extrinsic motivation comes its form of
reward and punishment.