Another one of the texts of the course: <Reading Speedster π>. Here I continue with the previous text: Word perception π, so if what is written does not make sense, I recommend that you go back and read that text and then return to this one.
Rather, let's deal with the parallel processes of the centers of the neural networks of reading.
Two readers are better than one
Up to the Word box, the process is simple: dot by dot, line by line, letter by letter, and we get a word! or a phrase. Downstream, or rather "non-syllabically", two streams of reading branch off: phonetic and semantic (figure below). In the phonetic (on the ocher grid figure), the text is pronounced (sub/vocalized), i.e. linguistic analysis, while semantic analysis extracts understanding. |
| (Serbian) Figure. Neural (nodular) model of reading. A semantic and phonetic network is added to the word box. In science, especially in neuroscience, we like to use models to understand, explain and simplify things. This means that it should not be taken literally. As part of our story, for the work of this chapter, we will stick to this model.. |
Words are first and best learned linguistically through phonetics and this is inevitable. However, understanding words is not the same as understanding sentences. For that, it is necessary to engage more centers for the processing of meaning, i.e. semantics. Learned words don't really do much good to go back to phonics, because it doesn't have a text comprehension section in it. That is when it is "read", i.e. pronounce the whole page but not even 'r' from understanding.
The semantic network (the green network in the figure) that we need for understanding is nevertheless separated from this network, anatomically and functionally. It is located a little further south where the information processing centers (temporal lobe) are located.
The semantic network is largely responsible for the organization of semantic memory, which I wrote about in the text: (new tab) Semantic memory, so for a better understanding of understanding, heh, it's good to study it.
Classical reading (in an adult) requires good cooperation of these separate networks - which cannot be ideal. Since phonetics depends on the characteristics of the language, it places a limit on understanding. The consequences are the upper and lower limits of the reading speed and the consumption of a lot of resources by engaging many centers.
Small readsters
This previously seemed to me to be the cause of my necessary naps after reading a few pages of reading material in elementary school.Speaking of elementary school students, how is it that in speed reading courses children learn speed reading with excellent comprehension so easily? And of course, can we use the answer to that question to quickly and easily make the entire reading process easier?
In children who have not yet fully developed their reading skills, these two networks do not yet fully cooperate. At the same time, in some children, during reading, more of the phonetic network is activated, while in others, the semantic network is more dominant. In the first group of children, it is characteristic that while reading aloud, they pronounce the text without mistakes. As a "consequence", however, understanding is not like that of the other group, where the semantic network is more dominant. In these children
That the semantic and phonetic networks are not coherently connected seems to be the reason why some children in speed reading courses easily develop astronomical reading speeds with perfect comprehension.
In the text word perception, we saw that after the flashed word, the activity only follows the semantic path and barely reaches the vocalization network. Also, the process is quite fast: in 0.2s the word is recognized and sent to the streams of understanding. If we start bypassing the phonetic, we waste time and resources.
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| Gif. 1. Word box in action. When the eyes see a word (consciously or not), it takes somewhere around 0.17-0.2s to detect activity in the word box on an fMRI scan. In the gif, it is about 200 ms when there is the most yellow. We can say that everything is done up to 500 ms. In the literature, this activity is referred to as the ventral stream and mainly serves to give meaning, i.e. to answer the questions who? what? What is the purpose? |
Just as we don't have to understand everything we say, we don't have to say everything we understand.