The more I learn about cognitive psychology processes, the more I can identify and name things that have been natural parts of everyday life. From perception to memory, things make more sense in the backdrop of our weekly lessons. For instance, as a movie lover, and student of film, I realized that some of the best movies involve a seemingly unattainable goal or problem that needs to be solved to get to the “happily ever after” ending we all love.

When reviewing our lesson on problem-solving, specifically the sections on obstacles and problem-solving techniques, I was reminded of a scene in one of my favorite movies. Let’s break down this scene and see how we can apply our cognitive psychology lessons to a famous film.

In what is arguably my all-time favorite, Star Wars – A New Hope, we are presented with a serious problem leading up to the movie’s end. A problem is defined as “a situation in which you need to accomplish a goal and the solution is not immediately obvious.” (Goldstein 2019 p 356). So, in Star Wars, the goal of the Rebel fleet was to destroy the Death Star before it wiped out their entire planet. With the solution not immediately obvious, rebel spies had to steal the schematics of the Death Star to be studied to find any weaknesses or vulnerabilities. These plans provided insight as to how to solve the problem. We learned that insight, the sudden comprehension, or problem solution resulting from the reorganization of a mental stimulus to yield an interpretation that was not initially obvious, is a key part of the Gestalt approach to problem-solving. Instead of looking at the overwhelming concept of the Death Star in its entirety, the focus was shifted to a previously undetected vulnerability that proved to be the key to solving the problem.

We now cut to the scene in the movie where the General of the rebel forces explains that they have found a weakness, and what they need to do to exploit it. The mission involves sending a one-man fighter down a trench and skim the surface to the designated point. The target area is only 2 meters wide “a small thermal exhaust port right below the main port – a precise hit will start a chain reaction that will destroy the station.”

The mental set (maybe based on previous experience with the Empire) of one of the pilots led him to exclaim “That’s impossible, even for a computer!”. And this is where the fun stuff happens. Our hero Luke Skywalker uses analogical transfer to show that the shot was indeed possible. “It’s not impossible, I used to bullseye Womp-rats in my T-16 back home. They’re not much bigger than 2 meters,” he says. Luke has identified a source problem similar to the target problem they are now facing. He does it again a few minutes later when the ability to pull out of the trench after the shot at full speed gives another pilot pause. Again, our hero says it’s “Just like Beggars Canyon back home.” Here we have another instance of analogical transfer with the source problem being previously dealt with successfully and using that to prove the target problem is solvable.

While this scene is tense and entertaining, it is also a very simple way to demonstrate analogical encoding in problem solving. Luke Skywalker first notices the similarities between what needs to be done and something he has done in the past, mapped the parts of the problems that were similar, and then applies that information to ultimately make the “impossible shot”. The result wasn’t exactly “happily ever after”, as there were 5 more movies to come in that timeline, but at least for now, the good guys won the day.