© Solaria, ShutterstockOur brain keeps a handy visual index of words we've seen before, speeding up the reading process, according to research presented Nov. 14 at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
The brain holds a "visual dictionary" of words we have read, allowing quick recognition without sounding out words each time we see them, a new study finds.
The research, presented today (Nov. 14) at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in Washington, D.C., could be useful for understanding the causes of reading disorders such as
dyslexia, according to the researchers. The study reveals how the brain works with words, which have both a visual, written component, and a sound-based phonology component.
"One camp of neuroscientists believes that we access both the phonology and the
visual perception of a word as we read it, and that the area or areas of the brain that do one, also do the other," study leader Laurie Glezer, a postdoctoral researcher at Georgetown University Medical Center, said in a statement. "But our study proves this isn't the case."
Instead, Glezer said, the brain dispenses of sound-based processing when reading and focuses on what words look like on paper.
"What we found is that once we've learned a word, it is placed in a purely visual dictionary in the brain. Having a purely visual representation allows for the fast and efficient word recognition we see in skilled readers," Glezer said. "This study is the first demonstration of that concept."
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