Thus reading is a form of visual perception. Also notice that you probably did not perceive this text letter by letter, but rather on a whole, by its words and phrases.
How people perceive an organize patterns on a whole instead of many separate parts is an example of Gestalt psychology, which is used to better understand the process of communication. According to these psychologists, the whole is different than the sum of its parts. The men who originated this, Max Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka, and Wolfgang KÖhler, further identified a number of principles by which we do such.
Proximity is the first of these principles of visual perception. This states that the closer objects are to one another, the more likely we are to mentally group them together. The second is Similarity. This law states that we link together parts of our visual field that are similar in color, shape, texture, etc. The third, Continuity, leads us to see a line as continuing in a particular direction, rather than making an abrupt turn. Closure, the fourth, is a law that states we prefer complete forms rather than incomplete forms, which allows us to perceive whole objects or perfect forms over imperfect ones. The law of Common Fate, the fifth law, leads us to group together objects that movie in the same direction. And the final law is that of Simplicity, which groups the previous five into one and which is central to the Gestalt approach, is the notion that people intuitively prefer the simplest, most stable of possible organizations. Which leads us to the figure/ground concept.
Not only does perception involve the psychological grouping mentioned above, but it also involves our ability to distinguish objects from their surroundings. For example, when you perceive an object such as this paper (the figure), the reading surface or room behind it is the background (the ground). These psychologists have designed many drawings to disengage this perception we have, such as the classic drawing of a white vase drawn over a dark background.
