[Eeglablist] segmenting resting-state EEG data to use in spectopo. Why segmenting?

[Ana Navarro Cebrian]

Hi all,

I have two resting state sessions of 5 minutes (pre and post) that I want
to compare with each other. I'm mostly interested in the alpha and theta
bands. In the past I've segmented resting state EEG activity and it seems
that, as far as I know, this is what people normally do. However, I was
just wondering why we do this instead of analyzing the entire resting-state
period all together. What are the benefits of segmenting resting state data
without any stimuli or responses? Could I calculate individual alpha peak
or just the average power using the entire period without segmenting? I'm
using the spectopo function right now to calculate power.

Thank you for any inputs!
Ana