RT Journal Article SR Electronic T1 Discriminating Valid from Spurious Indices of Phase-Amplitude Coupling JF eneuro JO eNeuro FD Society for Neuroscience SP ENEURO.0334-16.2016 DO 10.1523/ENEURO.0334-16.2016 VO 3 IS 6 A1 Ole Jensen A1 Eelke Spaak A1 Hyojin Park YR 2016 UL http://www.eneuro.org/content/3/6/ENEURO.0334-16.2016.abstract AB Recently there has been a strong interest in cross-frequency coupling, the interaction between neuronal oscillations in different frequency bands. In particular, measures quantifying the coupling between the phase of slow oscillations and the amplitude of fast oscillations have been applied to a wide range of data recorded from animals and humans. Some of the measures applied to detect phase-amplitude coupling have been criticized for being sensitive to nonsinusoidal properties of the oscillations and thus spuriously indicate the presence of coupling. While such instances of spurious identification of coupling have been observed, in this commentary we give concrete examples illustrating cases when the identification of cross-frequency coupling can be trusted. These examples are based on control analyses and empirical observations rather than signal-processing tools. Finally, we provide concrete advice on how to determine when measures of phase-amplitude coupling can be considered trustworthy.