Gestalt theoretical psychotherapy is a method of
psychotherapyPsychotherapy or personal counseling with a psychotherapist, is an intentional interpersonal relationship used by trained psychotherapists to aid a client or patient in problems of living.It aims to increase the individual's sense of their own well-being...
based strictly on
Gestalt psychologyGestalt psychology or gestaltism of the Berlin School is a theory of mind and brain positing that the operational principle of the brain is holistic, parallel, and analog, with self-organizing tendencies, or that the whole is different from the sum of its parts...
. It was developed by the German Gestalt
psychologistA psychologist is someone who studies the human mind and behavior. Research psychologists study human perception, cognition, attention, emotion, motivation, personality, behavior and interpersonal relationships...
and psychotherapist Hans-Jürgen P. Walter and his colleagues in Germany and Austria.
One of the most striking characteristics of Gestalt Theoretical Psychotherapy is the key role of the
epistemologicalEpistemology or theory of knowledge is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge...
grounding position of Gestalt theory (
critical realismIn the philosophy of perception, critical realism is the theory that some of our sense-data can and do accurately represent external objects, properties, and events, while other of our sense-data do not accurately represent any external objects, properties, and events.Critical...
) and its applicability to the fundamental, theoretical and practical problems in psychotherapy. In Gestalt Theoretical Psychotherapy this is closely bound up with the basic methodological approach (
holisticHolism is the idea that all the properties of a given system cannot be determined or explained by its component parts alone...
,
phenomenologicalIn psychology, phenomenology is used to refer to subjective experiences or their study. The experiencing subject can be considered to be the person or self, for purposes of convenience. In phenomenological philosophy 'experience' is a considerably more complex concept than it is usually taken to...
,
experimentIn scientific research, an experiment is a method of investigating causal relationships among variables, or to test a hypothesis. An experiment is a cornerstone of the empirical approach to acquiring data about the world and is used in both natural sciences and social sciences...
al) of Gestalt theory, its system theoretical approach, and its specific psychophysical and psychological approach.
Gestalt theoretical psychotherapy is related to but different from
Fritz PerlsFriedrich Salomon Perls , better known as Fritz Perls, was a noted German-born psychiatrist and psychotherapist of Jewish descent....
'
Gestalt therapyGestalt therapy is an existential and experiential psychotherapy that focuses on the individual's experience in the present moment, the therapist-client relationship, the environmental and social contexts in which these things take place, and the self-regulating adjustments people make as a result...
in its theoretical foundation.
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