similarity

psychology

Learn about this topic in these articles:

perceptual organization

  • ambiguous picture
    In perception: Gestalt principles

    In the right-hand panel, similarity, another principle of organization, is operative. Here, by virtue of similarity in brightness, the visual field tends to be perceptually articulated into alternating sets of black and gray rows.

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thought processes

  • B.F. Skinner
    In thought: The process of thought

    The law of association by similarity states that the sensation or idea of a particular object tends to evoke the idea of something that is similar to it. The early behaviourists, beginning with Watson, espoused essentially the same formulation but with some important modifications. For them the elements of the…

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transfer of training

  • In transfer of training: Stimulus and response similarity

    The method of paired-associate learning, in which a person is asked to learn to associate one syllable or word with another (e.g., complete–hot, safe–green, wild–soft), encouraged the investigation of the influence of stimulus and response similarity on transfer of learning. Typically these pairs of…

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