WASHINGTON (VR)-- The processing speed of the human brain turns out to be much swifter in some regards than once believed. Take our vision. Neuroscientists at MIT have discovered that the eye can process an image in as little as 13 milliseconds... faster than the speeds previously believed. To look help us look into vision, perception, and how we organize data, we are joined by MIT professor of brain and cognitive sciences, Mary Potter. Potter: We know that the brain begins to get information instantly on the retina and then it moves this information very rapidly up into the early parts of the brain. What we didn't know is how long it would take to get to the point where the brain understands concepts, understands what things are. That that's a cup over there on my desk." Potter says that within those 13 milliseconds, the average individual doesn't see an object clearly and beautifully, but is able to grab enough contextual clues about an object that they can piece together what that object is. For example, while they may not be able to see a horse, they might see a few crucial features say the size of the animal, the length of its nose and say... "Horse!" Before Potter's study, many scientists believed it took about 100 milliseconds for the brain to process an image. "The brain doesn't have to do some of the back and forth thinking that some have supposed." However, at the speeds Potter tested her subjects, the guesses were correct only just above chance, but far from perfect. Still, the results reached significant levels, suggesting that the brain has begun processing the image with just the amount of information that it can obtain within one-seventy-fifth of a second. MIT's Potter says that the training effect of interpreting images quickly through constant use of smart phones, the web, and TV may not be as key as the inventory or library of images that we build up during our lifetimes. For the experiment, subjects came into the lab and were seated in front of a computer and were instructed to look at a series of six pictures. On the monitor in the upper left corner researchers placed a label which had a description written on it--for example, a couple smiling. After the exposure subjects were asked if they saw what was written, and they keyed yes or no on their computer. During practice sessions, subjects were first shown a set of 6 - 8 images, all presented within one second. As expected, subjects exhibited a high degree of accuracy. Then they practiced with 80 milliseconds, then 53 milliseconds, 27 milliseconds, before the 13 millisecond trials began. The results of the 13 millisecond battery demonstrated a a significantly better than chance level of correct identification. This occurred even if the subject originally struck "no" on their keyboard, declaring they believed they hadn't seen the image in the series shown.
Source: Voice of Russia
