No evidence for modulation of the readiness potential by respiratory phase during natural breathing
4 affiliations
- 1Laboratory for Understanding Consciousness, Intentions, and Decisions in Brains and Machines (LUCID), Chapman University, Orange, California, United States of America
- 2Schmid College of Science and Technology, Chapman University, Orange, California, United States of America
- 3Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, United States of America
- 4Fowler School of Engineering, Chapman University, Orange, California, United States of America
Abstract
Respiratory processes are increasingly implicated in shaping neural activity and behavior. Recent studies have reported a coupling between respiratory phase and the cortical readiness potential (RP), suggesting that breathing may modulate the neural processes preceding voluntary action. Here, using electroencephalography recordings in humans, we re-examine this claim using the original dataset and a new independent dataset, as well as in simulated data with no coupling. We show that the reported association arises from a confound: both RP amplitude and respiratory phase are coupled to movement onset. The original analysis does not control for this dependency, leading to a spurious effect that is also observed in simulated data. When trials are instead grouped by respiratory phase at the time of movement, thereby controlling for this confound, the apparent coupling disappears. Across datasets, Bayesian analyses provide evidence for the absence of an effect under natural breathing conditions. These findings indicate that respiratory phase does not directly modulate RP amplitude during spontaneous behavior. More broadly, they reveal a shortcoming of phase-amplitude coupling analyses applied to epoched data with slowly varying signals, and highlight the importance of controlling for shared dependencies when interpreting physiological–neural relationships.
Respiration influences neuronal activity in a number of contexts, and recent work suggests that respiratory phase is coupled to the cortical readiness potential. This study challenges this link and reports that the previously identified association arises from movement onset confounds, highlighting the importance of controlling for shared dependencies when interpreting physiological–neural relationships.
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BibTeX
@article{jeaybizot2026evidence,
title = {{No evidence for modulation of the readiness potential by respiratory phase during natural breathing}},
author = {Lucas Jeay-Bizot and Raniyah Chishti and Uri Maoz and Aaron Schurger},
journal = {PLOS Biology},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.1371/journal.pbio.3003982},
url = {https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3003982},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - No evidence for modulation of the readiness potential by respiratory phase during natural breathing
AU - Lucas Jeay-Bizot
AU - Raniyah Chishti
AU - Uri Maoz
AU - Aaron Schurger
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/02
JO - PLOS Biology
DO - 10.1371/journal.pbio.3003982
UR - https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3003982
AB - Respiratory processes are increasingly implicated in shaping neural activity and behavior. Recent studies have reported a coupling between respiratory phase and the cortical readiness potential (RP), suggesting that breathing may modulate the neural processes preceding voluntary action. Here, using electroencephalography recordings in humans, we re-examine this claim using the original dataset and a new independent dataset, as well as in simulated data with no coupling. We show that the reported association arises from a confound: both RP amplitude and respiratory phase are coupled to movement onset. The original analysis does not control for this dependency, leading to a spurious effect that is also observed in simulated data. When trials are instead grouped by respiratory phase at the time of movement, thereby controlling for this confound, the apparent coupling disappears. Across datasets, Bayesian analyses provide evidence for the absence of an effect under natural breathing conditions. These findings indicate that respiratory phase does not directly modulate RP amplitude during spontaneous behavior. More broadly, they reveal a shortcoming of phase-amplitude coupling analyses applied to epoched data with slowly varying signals, and highlight the importance of controlling for shared dependencies when interpreting physiological–neural relationships. Respiration influences neuronal activity in a number of contexts, and recent work suggests that respiratory phase is coupled to the cortical readiness potential. This study challenges this link and reports that the previously identified association arises from movement onset confounds, highlighting the importance of controlling for shared dependencies when interpreting physiological–neural relationships.
SN - 1545-7885
ER -