Scientists discover the speed at which the brain processes information

Human behavior may appear fluid and fast. Typing away at a keyboard or zipping through a conversation can sometimes feel like lightning in action. Yet researchers suggest that our actual rate at which our brains process information is surprisingly slow, around 10 bits every second (bits/s).

This contrast between how much data we take in and how slowly we seem to convert it into decisions raises questions about the workings of our brains.

Why this slow pace matters

We gather massive amounts of sensory input around the clock. Bright lights, crisp sounds, and subtle touches provide our brains with a continuous stream of data.

Yet our responses look sluggish when compared to the gigabits of raw input reaching our eyes and other senses. 

Many studies suggest that, no matter whether we are playing competitive video games or trying to memorize entire decks of cards, we still clock in at roughly 10 bits/s.

These findings got special attention when Jieyu Zheng and Markus Meister from the California Institute of Technology presented new insights that add to the discussion.

According to their work, the information throughput of a human being is about 10 bits/s.

Layers of complexity in brain processes

Zheng and Meister point out that our retinal cells alone can transmit hundreds of millions of bits/s, yet the overall speed at which our brains process information in order to then act or think is often stuck at a fraction of that capacity.

“The stark contrast … touches on fundamental aspects of brain function,” they stated. They highlight scenarios like typing or speaking, where our performance hovers in the same narrow range, no matter what the activity is. 

Some say this might be a simple product of our evolutionary limits. Others note the complexity of neural pathways that might need to “sift” or condense high volumes of raw data into the choices we eventually make.

Our best efforts at top speed

Examples from sports and esports show us how we behave when the stakes are high. Expert Tetris players can drop and rotate blocks almost two hundred times per minute, but once we subtract predictable or repeated movements, the rate of meaningful actions aligns with that 10-bits/s mark.

The same story emerges in professional StarCraft matches, where a flurry of keystrokes often masks the fact that only a handful of them decide the game. Studies of blindfolded speedcubing also reveal average data processing levels in that 10 bits/s ballpark.

Brain processing is a puzzle

Why would we need billions of neurons for such a modest output? One proposed idea is that our senses handle a ton of information in parallel, while our conscious decisions appear in a strict sequence.

Even though the brain has huge parallel capacity, final actions (like speech or typing) occur one at a time. 

Researchers see hints of that in the early visual system. The retina does significant data reduction by filtering out certain signals.

Later stages may pare this down further to the key bits that guide us. Some scientists refer to an “inner” brain that operates slowly but with flexibility, while an “outer” brain processes huge amounts of raw input in parallel.

Why does any of this matter?

This view might explain why reading, speaking, and typing share a similar bottleneck. Reading a sentence or listening to someone talk both come down to sorting through a few bits of core meaning at a time. 

Even memory competitions, where contestants learn thousands of digits in just a few minutes, show that their actual rate of storing new material lines up with the same slow throughput.

The difference is that these experts use clever techniques (like structured mental images) to work within these limits.

Implications for brain interfaces

Some companies hope to create brain-computer devices that bypass typical input methods. A few projects explored implants that feed camera signals directly to the retina.

Yet no approach so far beats a simple channel like speech or typing for clarity and efficiency.

If the brain’s “trickle” of information is the primary limit, those implant devices might end up matching only what we already achieve with our voice or hands.

Where do we go from here?

Many open questions remain. Researchers suspect there could be hidden pockets of speed in tasks we have not fully studied, or perhaps unconscious processes that never bubble to the surface.

Others wonder if humans, despite these limits, have simply built cultures and environments that run at a pace our brains can handle. 

The future may lie in pinpointing how certain species operate in their own niches or how humans might develop new ways to get the most from our 10 bits/s.

For now, we seem to function just fine despite a remarkable gap between what we sense and what we choose or do.

The study is published in Neuron.

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