Improving test-retest reliability of quantitative electroencephalography using different preprocessing approaches

Abstract

This work aims to assess the effect of preprocessing approaches over test-retest reliability of quantitative electroencephalography measurements. Two electroencephalography sessions were recorded during an eyes-closed resting state condition in 15 young healthy individuals. The second session was 4 to 6 weeks after the first one. Clean recordings were obtained from the implementation of different preprocessing approaches commonly used in the literature. We then estimated the power spectrum density, for each individual and preprocessing approach, in six frequency bands: delta, theta, alpha1, alpha2, beta, and gamma. Test-retest reliability using the intraclass correlation coefficient was calculated for power spectrum in each methodology and frequency band. We found that the test-retest reliability varied considerably across frequency bands and preprocessing approaches. Reliability was higher for theta, alpha1, and alpha2 frequency bands. Also, the use of preprocessing approach that includes a robust reference to average and independent component analysis, can improve test-retest reliability in other bands such as beta and gamma. Results suggest that quantitative electroencephalography are test-retest reliable and can be used in longitudinal studies.

Day-to-Day Test-Retest Reliability of EEG Profiles in Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder and Typical Development

“…EEG power for mid-range frequencies (theta, alpha, and beta, as opposed to delta and gamma; Ip et al, 2018) and relative power (as opposed to absolute power; Salinsky et al, 1991) have shown correlation coefficients >0.8 for EEG sessions a few weeks apart; this is in the range of test-retest correlations for commonly used tests of cognitive ability (Elliott, 2007;Canivez and Watkins, 1999). Methodological advances in EEG preprocessing, such as a robust reference to average and wavelet independent component analysis which act to attenuate the effects of data collection artifact, improve test-retest reliability in higher frequency bands such as beta and gamma (Suarez-Revelo et al, 2016). However, the reliability of these features in children with or without neurodevelopmental disabilities remains unmeasured.…”

Reliability of Mental Workload Index Assessed by EEG with Different Electrode Configurations and Signal Pre-Processing Pipelines

“…In 2017, Shirk et al [ 39 ] tested the impact of subjective artifact removal on Event-Related Potential (ERP) results, estimating the inter-rater reliability of different subjective signal-cleaning approaches. The test–retest study by Suarez-Revelo and colleagues [ 40 , 41 ] compared different pre-processing of resting state EEG for the estimation of spectral power in six frequency bands. For specific MWL correlates estimation, a test–retest study was conducted in 2021 by Getzmann et al [ 42 ] to assess the performance of the cEEGrids recordings, which are based on C-shaped electrode arrays positioned around the ear.…”

Manual or Automatic? Putting standardized EEG-Preprocessing to the Test with the Alpha-Asymmetries of Personality

“…Interestingly, reliability was most robust for the alpha and theta bands (Suarez-Revelo et al, 2016). Thus, it is recommendable to test the influence that any newly developed toolbox exerts on raw EEG data ideally by comparing it to both human-dependent approaches and other established automated programs on a variety of datasets before implementing it on a formal study.…”