Reaction Time Test

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

This is pretty good. It shows how fast you can react to visual stimulus:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/sleep/sheep/reaction_version5.swf
Try it a few times before you read the tip below.














































I'll give you a tip on how to speed up your reaction time - don't look at the sheep. Stare at the dart, and you will find you nail them much faster. You are also not fooled by distracting movements.
This is the technique of many Japanese martial arts. Don't look at your opponent ( or the object he is using). Those of us who are old enough saw this often demonstrated by Po-sama on Kung Fu.

 

[silver_pilate]

And interestingly enough, the phenomenon of the tip they gave is entirely explained by our anatomy. Rods and cones are the two types of photoreceptors in the retina. Rods mediate black and white vision and are extremely sensitive to light. Cones mediate color vision and are less sensitive to light. What makes our peripheral vision so much better at sensing movement than our focused vision is the distribution and anatomical connections of these two receptors. The focal point (fovea) consists entirely of cones while rods are located outside of the central portion of the retina in the periphery (along with scattered cones for color detection). The way information from these two receptors is conveyed to the optic tract is what makes our peripheral vision better at sensing movement. The output cells of the retina are called ganglion neurons. A single cone projects circuitously to a single ganglion output neuron (known as a P-type or parvicellular ganglion neuron). On the other hand, many rods (sometimes thousands of them) project to a single ganglion output neuron (known as an M-type or magnocellular ganglion neuron). Thus the light focused on the periphery of the eye falls mostly onto very light-sensitive receptors and is transmitted to higher centers by neurons with very large receptive fields.

Neuroscience is fun (or so I keep telling my students ).

Edited to add: they have complicated the issue here a bit in requiring a higher level cognitive processing to recognize and not respond to the distracting movements of sheep. If it were an issue of only recognizing a motion and reacting to it, I bet you'd see an even greater improvement when observing using peripheral vision vs. focused vision.

--nathan

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

The tip was from me. And it was because the peripheral vision is far more sensitive to movement. It is in our evolution to be aware of threats and attack.

In sword arts, or a fast draw duel, if you look at the opponents sword/gun hand, you will always be a few tenths of a second too late to react to a movement . If you stare off to one side, you will automatically react the moment he makes a move. The same technique is used by quick shot experts.

It can be honed with practice to become an autonomous reaction where the muscles react before the brain has actually had time to process the signal.

 

[Mark Behnke]

This is a fun one too, harder than it looks.
The second link has a little explanation.

http://www.grassrootsdragracing.com/treesimulator.html

http://www.staginglight.com/guide/react.html

 

[Dago Red]

thanks! I was a bobcat in the first one, guess I"m just not that fast. I was using my peripheral to begin with, I'll try the other one now. fun stuff.

Red

 

[Bill Hoffman]

Under 0.25 sec ave. Not bad for an old guy. 65+

 

[Atlas Knife Company]

0.168 avg, and my 10 year old son kicks my butt.