Study Shows Brains Are Processing Words Faster Than Ever

Our brains are evolving.

A recent study has found that human brains are surprisingly adept at processing the rapid influx of messages typical in modern communication, such as texts and social media updates. Researchers discovered that the brain can grasp the fundamental linguistic structure of a short sentence in approximately 150 milliseconds—around the same duration as a blink of an eye.

Lead researcher Liina Pylkkanen, a professor at New York University, explained that the brain’s language comprehension system operates similarly to how we perceive visual scenes. Just as we can quickly understand the essence of an image from a single glance, our brains can efficiently interpret text. Pylkkanen noted, “In the time it takes to hear a single syllable, the brain can identify the structure of a brief sentence.”

The shift towards email, texting, and social media has led to a fragmented way of consuming information, with constant notifications demanding our attention. This change indicates that our brains are not only capable of processing quick messages instinctively but can also make rapid decisions based on them, such as determining whether to respond to a social media update or delete an email.

To explore how well we comprehend these fast messages, the researchers conducted experiments that tracked brain activity as participants read either coherent sentence fragments (e.g., “nurses clean wounds”) or random lists of nouns (e.g., “heart lungs livers”). Published in Science Advances and the Journal of Neuroscience, the findings showed that the left temporal cortex—the brain region associated with language comprehension—could distinguish between the two types of input in as little as 130 milliseconds.

The study indicated that the brain can identify basic sentence structures rapidly, even in the presence of grammatical errors, suggesting a preference for understanding phrase structures rather than fully grasping grammatical nuances. Additionally, researchers observed that the brain can swiftly adjust for minor mistakes in phrase structure, correcting errors within 400 milliseconds and processing the phrases as if they were grammatically accurate. This rapid correction may explain why readers often overlook small mistakes in text, as their brains have already made internal adjustments.