ArticleBrain sciences2026
Intra- and Inter-Session Reliability of Average- and Trial-Level Motor Evoked Potential Amplitudes.
Article in Brain sciences, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundMotor evoked potential (MEP) amplitude elicited by single-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is widely used as an indirect index of corticospinal excitability (CSE). Averaged MEP amplitudes are commonly used to improve measurement stability, but averaging may obscure some trial-level information across the recording sequence. As trial-level and hierarchical modelling approaches become increasingly common, it remains important to determine how averaged and trial-level MEP amplitudes should be interpreted as measures of CSE.
objectiveThis study compared the intra-session and inter-session reliability of averaged and trial-level MEP amplitudes, with exploratory block analyses used to examine whether trial-order structure was obscured by averaging.
methodsTwelve healthy adults completed two sessions with three CSE assessments at T1, T2, and T3 (T1 and T2 20 min apart; T3 at least 48 h later). At each time point, 25 single-pulse MEPs were elicited at 120% resting motor threshold and recorded from the right first dorsal interosseous muscle. Reliability was assessed using intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC), coefficients of variation (CV), minimal detectable change at the 95% confidence level (MDC95), Bland-Altman analysis, linear mixed-effects models, exploratory sequential block analyses, and Bayesian variance decomposition.
resultsAverage MEP amplitudes remained stable across T1, T2, and T3. Average-level reliability was good across all timepoints (ICC = 0.899) and excellent within session (T1 vs. T2: ICC = 0.992, CV = 4.935%, MDC95 = 0.191 mV). Inter-session average-level reliability remained good (ICC = 0.844-0.852). In contrast, trial-level analyses revealed substantial within-participant variability, with low ICCs, high CVs, and large MDC95 values. Bland-Altman analyses showed minimal mean bias but substantially wider limits of agreement for trial-level data. Exploratory sequential block analyses showed that, in the late block, T1 differs significantly from T3. Bayesian modelling indicated that residual trial-level variability exceeded between-subject variability, with a posterior ICC of 0.336.
conclusionsAveraging 25 MEPs provides a reliable estimate of corticospinal excitability, but it masks variability. Trial-level and exploratory block analyses suggest that this variability may contain meaningful temporal structure, supporting trial-level modelling as a complementary approach for validating and interpreting averaged MEP estimates.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.