Reading Rates and the Information Rate of a Human Channel

Abstract

The limitation on the rate at which information can be transmitted over an ordinary telephone channel is a human one. In this study people read words as fast as they were able to; from these results some deductions are made about the capacity of a human being as an information channel. The discrepancy between human channel capacity measured thus (40–50 bits/sec) and telephone and television channel capacity (about 50,000 bits/sec and 50,000,000 bits/sec respectively) is provocative.