Dynamic time warping in the analysis of event-related potentials

The aim of this article is to compute reliable templates of event-related potentials (ERPs) for homogeneous groups of subjects and to automatically quantify the morphological characteristics of the ERPs. We developed a method based on dynamic time warping (DTW). The method was applied to ERPs recorded from normal and dyslexic children during two reading tasks. We found that characteristic latency and amplitude changes of ERP components are due to task and pathology. Our results support the idea that dyslexia involves different and complex cerebral functions aside from the language system. This mathematical approach provides reproducible analysis criteria that are crucial for the reliability of ERP analysis.