EEG-ConvTransformer for Single-Trial EEG based Visual Stimuli Classification

Abstract: Different categories of visual stimuli activate different responses in the human brain. These signals can be captured with EEG for utilization in applications such as Brain-Computer Interface (BCI). However, accurate classification of single-trial data is challenging due to low signal-to-noise ratio of EEG. This work introduces an EEG-ConvTranformer network that is based on multi-headed self-attention. Unlike other transformers, the model incorporates self-attention to capture inter-region interactions. It further extends to adjunct convolutional filters with multi-head attention as a single module to learn temporal patterns. Experimental results demonstrate that EEG-ConvTransformer achieves improved classification accuracy over the state-of-the-art techniques across five different visual stimuli classification tasks. Finally, quantitative analysis of inter-head diversity also shows low similarity in representational subspaces, emphasizing the implicit diversity of multi-head attention.