Would the human body react faster to touch or sight I am currently working on an assignment for my physics class, but I believe my question is biology related. For a two person lab, I am trying to time how long it takes a tennis ball to fall two meters, Using basic physics equations I was able to determine that the ball should take around 0.66 seconds to hit the ground but my results are generally very off. Would I be able to react faster if I were to stop the timer when I felt the ball hit my other hand, or would I have a worse reaction time than if I were to use my current method of stopping the timer when I see/hear the ball hit the ground.

A " **touch** " or "haptic" sensation will be **much faster** due to several reasons:

* Haptic feedback can be processed without the presence of any higher-order cognitive processing, therefore meaning that the signals are being processed via a monosynaptic route.
* There are short reflex arcs between the spinal cord and the limb (meaning that you can react before you are consciously aware of it)



A **visual** sensation will be **much** **slower** :

* The processing of the signal will require higher-order cognitive processing, and this takes time. I read that it takes between 50ms-200ms. (polysynaptic route)



Interesting article about this topic