During everyday interactions, people routinely speak at rates of 120 to 200 words per minute. For a listener to understand speech at these rates \u2013 and not lose track of the conversation \u2013 the brain must comprehend the meaning of each of these words very rapidly.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat we can do this so easily is an amazing feat of the human brain \u2013 especially given that the meaning of words can vary greatly depending on the context,\u201d says Edmund Lalor<\/a>, associate professor of biomedical engineering<\/a> and neuroscience at the University of Rochester and Trinity College Dublin. \u201cFor example, \u2018I saw a bat<\/em> flying overhead last night\u2019 versus \u2018the baseball player hit a home run with his favorite bat.\u2019\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Now, researchers in Lalor\u2019s lab have identified a brain signal that indicates whether a person is indeed comprehending what others are saying \u2013 and have shown they can track the signal using relatively inexpensive EEG (electroencephalography) readings taken on a person\u2019s scalp.<\/p>\n This could have a number of \u201cpotentially significant\u201d applications, Lalor says. They include:<\/p>\n\n