A modified Wavelet-Common Spatial Pattern method for decoding hand movement directions in brain computer interfaces

Neethu Robinson, A. Prasad Vinod, Cuntai Guan, Kai Keng Ang, Keng Peng Tee

Abstract: The decoding of hand movement kinematics using non-invasive data acquisition techniques is a recent area of research in Brain Computer Interface (BCI). In this work, we use an Electroencephalography (EEG) based BCI to decode directional information from the brain data collected during an actual hand movement experiment. The objective is to find the discriminative features of movement related potential that can classify any two directions out of the four orthogonal directions in which subject performs right hand movement. The performance using Wavelet-Common Spatial Pattern (W-CSP) algorithm and its variations in terms of spatial regularization is studied and compared. The work further analyzes the involvement of frontal, parietal and motor regions in carrying movement kinematics information with the help of spatial plots given by CSP. The performance variability for different directions in various subjects is another important observation in our results. The work aims to provide a more refined movement control command set for BCIs by developing efficient techniques to decode the direction of movement.