You may remember the significance of Gestalt Theory in a psychology class, but these principles are also important to designers. They help designers improve the aesthetic appeals, functionality, and user-friendliness of their works.
There are 6 main principles:
- similarity
- continuation
- closure
- proximity
- figure/ground
- symmetry & order
1) SIMILARITY: It is human nature for us to visually group similar, regardless of their proximity to each other– grouped by color, shape, or size
2) CONTINUATION: It is human nature for our eyes to follow the smoothest path when viewing lines, regardless of how the lines are truly drawn
3) CLOSURE: It is human nature for our brains to automatically fill in the missing parts of a design or image to create a whole. For example when looking at a complex arrangement of elements, we tend to look for a single, recognizable pattern.
4) PROXIMITY: It is human nature for us to perceive objects positioned closer together as more related than objects further apart.
5) FIGURE/GROUND: It is human nature for the eye to categorize elements into two groups—Elements are perceived as either as the element in focus, the figure, or the background the figure rests on, the ground.
6) SYMMETRY & ORDER: It is human nature for us to prefer simplicity, clarity, and order. Thus, we are likely to perceive objects as symmetrical shapes forming around their center.
For more details, visit:
https://www.toptal.com/designers/ui/gestalt-principles-of-design
2 Comments
Josh Mukherjee · April 4, 2022 at 7:10 pm
The continuation aspect is really cool. It’s interesting that our mind follows the smoothest path and does not follow the colors.
Riley Thompson · April 15, 2022 at 7:32 pm
I think the Symmetry & Order aspect is a very interesting element of perception. Since we were first exposed to those individual shapes (rather than the whole shape), we view it as made up of all of those shapes. I’m curious though, if we had been shown/taught something (like that shape on the left) as its own unique entity before we were taught/shown the triangle, circle, and rectangle as distinct entities, if we would instead view those shapes as pieces of the bigger shape we were taught first, or if our minds would still break the bigger one down into smaller pieces.
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