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Updated: Nov 15, 2025
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Published on: September 22, 2023
Experimental sleep restriction increases latency jitter in pain elicited cortical responses
J O Hansen1, P M Omland1,2, K B Nilsen1,3
1NTNU, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Department of Neuromedicine and Movement Science, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Postboks 8905, 7491, Trondheim, Norway.
Objective:
Previous studies have shown increased pain scores to painful stimulation after experimental sleep restriction, but reduced or unchanged magnitude of the event related potentials (ERPs) when averaged in the time-domain. However, some studies found increased response magnitude when averaging in the time-frequency domain. The aim of this study was to determine whether ERP-latency jitter may contribute to this discrepancy.
Methods:
Ninety painful electrical stimuli were given to 21 volunteers after two nights of 50% sleep restriction and after two nights of habitual sleep. ERPs were analyzed in the time-domain (N2-and P2-peaks) and time-frequency domain (power spectral density). We quantified latency jitter by the mean consecutive difference (MCD) between single-trial peak latencies and by phase locking value (PLV) across trials.
Results:
P2-MCD increased from 20.4 ± 2.1 ms after habitual sleep to 24.3 ± 2.2 ms after sleep restriction (19%, p = 0.038) and PLV decreased from 0.582 ± 0.015 after habitual sleep to 0.536 ± 0.015 after sleep restriction (7.9%, p = 0.009). We found no difference for N2-MCD.
Conclusions:
Our results indicate that partial sleep restriction increase latency jitter in cortical responses to experimental pain.
Significance:
Latency jitter may contribute to the discrepancies between ERP-responses in the time-frequency domain and time-domain. Latency jitter should be considered when ERPs are analyzed.
