60.5 Feet at 93MPH – Baseball & Visual Processing

Sometimes, it can be difficult for new clients to understand why graphic recording and graphic facilitation is so effective. This article is part of an ongoing series, It’s a Visual World. In it, we explore everyday experiences that showcase the myriad ways our brains work more efficiently with visual input. Look for areas in your daily life for the visual iconography you rely on, then give us a call. Seeing is believing.

A gif of a pencil drawing a circle.

You're On Deck

Contact us to start using visual input in your business practices.

Get started

High Heat

The average speed of a major league fastball is 92.7 miles per hour, which means a batter has about .4 seconds to read the pitch and react before the baseball has covered the 60 feet 6 inches to cross home plate.

An illustration of a baseball player, ready to swing at an incoming pitch.

That’s good, because it takes our brains less than half a second (400-500 milliseconds) to respond to visual stimuli. One MIT study actually found that the brain can process entire images that are seen for as little as 13 milliseconds!

When you consider that nearly half that time is eaten up by sending the motor signal and giving the response, our visual processing speed is blistering. That speed is thanks to the nearly 100 billion, (with a “b”) neurons we have.

Whole Brain Baseball

University of Rochester researchers found that more than half of the surface of our brains is dedicated to processing visual stimuli. It’s why we encourage our clients to practice “whole brain thinking,” which of course means working visually.

Think of it this way, if you were trying to make the playoffs, would you bench more than half your team? If you’re working without leveraging visuals and imagery, that’s effectively what you’re doing.

Batter Up

Ready to take your business to the big leagues? Get in touch with ImageThink and start working visually. From graphic recording to graphic facilitation to social listening murals, we take the shortest route to your audience’s brains – through their eyes. It’s time to take bigger swings. Step up to the plate.

Graphic facilitation is effective for businesses because we process visuals in less than half a second.

Ready to change your thinking?

Inquire for Pricing