The brain processes images in 13 milliseconds

Neuroscientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have established the minimum time during which a person needs to show an image so that the brain can process it. The rate is 13 milliseconds. This is significantly less than anticipated. Previously, scientists estimated the processing time of information at about 100 milliseconds.

During the experiment, subjects were asked to signal if they saw a certain type of picture, such as a “picnic” or “smiling couple,” while they were shown a series of 6 or 12 images with an interval of 13-80 milliseconds. The illustration above shows a sample of such a sequence of frames.

Scientists believe that such a high speed of information processing by the brain helps to control the eyes and select objects for consideration. The eye is able to move at a speed of 3 times per second, and during this time the brain must recognize all the information in the field of view, be aware of what has been seen and decide where to look further.

Starting the experiment, scientists assumed that they could set the brain recognition limit to half that of the previously considered standard 100 milliseconds. To their surprise, the participants in the experiment showed a clear difference from random guessing at each increase in the image display speed: 80 ms, 53 ms, 40 ms, 27 ms and 13 ms. The 13 ms indicator was the shortest possible time for updating the image on a computer monitor, so experimenting with a further reduction in the limit did not work. But it is quite possible that the speed of the brain is even higher than that established in this study.

True, scientists suggest that image processing can actually continue in the "background" after exposure of the picture, that is, longer than 13 milliseconds. It was not possible to establish this fact in the framework of this experiment, because the subjects were interviewed some time after the sequence of images was shown. But it is obvious that the pictures do not “erase” from the memory after 13 milliseconds, otherwise people would not be able to answer the question correctly. That is, the photos remain in some part of the memory after processing. It is also known that the decision on the specific direction of eye movement is made in 100-140 milliseconds.

Theoretically, this study allows us to conclude that a person is able to recognize a video sequence with a frequency of 77 frames per second or more, which was previously considered impossible. Now you have to update the information on the corresponding page on Wikipedia, which states the ability of the brain to process only 10-12 separate images per second.

The scientific work is published in the journal ”Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics” ( free access ).