To read or not to be

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Being a blogger is a noble mission (being a paid blogger is also a beautiful mission, but that’s another story altogether). Nevertheless, if you want to have a successful blog, you should treat it like you get paid to write. Act like a professional.

Every professional needs to have an instrument, and your instrument as a blogger is information. I tend to think that the most decent equivalent of information is a book. In all types of its earthly embodiments – screens or paper. It’s up to you.

Neuroscientists have always been interested in reading process. What’s really happening inside your brain case when letters turn into words, words into sentences, and sentences into the second volume of The Twilight Saga?

Up until today, scientists have only monitored participants’ neural activity during reading of just individual words. It doesn’t provide a clear picture because our reading speed is several words per second.

The researchers have come up with a solution. They combined functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with eye tracking. The study results showed that words are represented in the brain not as abstract symbols but as visual images of the real world. For example, when the participants read about Harry Potter’s first flying lesson, the brain lights up in the same regions as it would if they saw other people’s motion.

The researchers plan to use these findings for diagnosing and treating memory problems, attention deficit disorder, dyslexia, side effects of a stroke and brain injury.

This study closely resonates with the latest research of speed reading that shows that it is not a super power of the 21st century, but a loss of a large amount of information during reading. Even if you have a toned brain, you have no time to process all the visual information when you significantly increase your reading rate.

So, if you read a new book, maybe it’s time to slow down and savor it?

#readHardPartyHard #wonderReader