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Explainable machine-learning integration of pre-task and preparatory EEG: revealing complementary predictive
1School of Psychology, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China.
Introduction:
Expert motor behavior varies among athletes and across repetitive actions; however, conventional brain-behavior analyses can conflate these statistical levels. We characterized the behavioral architecture of expert table tennis serves and tested whether pre-task and action-preparatory EEG contribute information at different behavioral scales.
Methods:
A total of 22 expert athletes completed 100 cue-directed serves with trial-resolved landing coordinates. Unsupervised principal component analysis characterized complete landing distributions. Eyes-closed pre-task EEG provided a hypothesis-informed alpha-organization index combining individual alpha peak frequency and fronto-central alpha coherence. EEG spectral power during action preparation was evaluated using nested leave-one-athlete-out learning, within-athlete permutation testing, grouped permutation importance, and multiscale probability integration.
Results:
The two dominant landing components explained 57.2% of behavioral variance and primarily reflected reproducible individualized placement patterns, whereas a smaller component (7.4% explained variance) was more closely aligned with task-defined performance. Pre-task alpha organization was associated with higher target-zone reliability (r = 0.68, p = 0.002) and a smaller 95% landing area (r = -0.50, p = 0.034; n = 18). Preparatory EEG contained modest information that generalized trial outcomes to unseen athletes (macro AUC = 0.589; p = 0.0063), with predictive information concentrated in theta activity in both preparation stages, Prep2 high-beta activity, and parietal sensors. Athlete-average preparatory activities did not reconstruct pre-task alpha organization under leave-one-athlete-out validation.
Discussion:
Pre-task and preparatory EEG carried complementary rather than interchangeable predictive information. Pre-task EEG was related to between-athlete performance propensity, whereas preparatory EEG offered weak but reliable within-athlete trial evidence. The value of the transparent machine-learning framework did not lie solely in achieving high prediction accuracy; rather, it was its capability to discover behavioral structure, test cross-athlete generalization, explain predictive information, and integrate neural evidence at a statistical level relevant to its operation.
