Recorded Versus Synthetic Spectral-compatible Ground Motions: A Comparative Analysis of Structural Seismic Responses

TL;DR

This study compares structural seismic responses under synthetic and recorded ground motions, showing synthetic motions are suitable for general response analysis but less accurate for extreme events in long-period structures.

Contribution

It provides a systematic comparison of synthetic and recorded ground motions, highlighting their similarities and differences in structural seismic response metrics.

Findings

Synthetic motions closely match recorded motions in overall response behavior.

Significant differences (>50%) in response extremes for long-period structures.

Recorded motions exhibit non-Gaussian features affecting rare-event response metrics.

Abstract

This paper presents a comparative analysis of structural seismic responses under two types of ground motion inputs: (i) synthetic motions generated by stochastic spectral-compatible ground motion models and (ii) recorded motions from an earthquake database. Both ground motion datasets are calibrated to a shared target response spectrum to ensure consistent spectral median, variance, and correlation structure. Five key stochastic response metrics-probability distributions, statistical moments, correlations, tail indices, and variance-based global sensitivity indices-are systematically evaluated for two representative structures: a medium-period building and a limiting case of a long-period tower. The comparison accounts for uncertainties both from ground motion and structural parameters. The results reveal that synthetic motions closely replicate recorded motions in terms of global response behavior-including distributions, mean and variance, correlation structure, and dominant uncertainty sources-indicating their suitability for routine seismic design and parametric studies. However, substantial differences emerge in response extremes for long-period structures, particularly in metrics governed by rare events, such as higher-order moments and tail behavior. These differences, which often exceed 50%, can be attributed to the non-Gaussian features and complex characteristics inherent in recorded motions, which are less pronounced in synthetic datasets. The findings support the use of synthetic ground motions for evaluating global seismic response characteristics, while highlighting their limitations in capturing rare-event behavior and long-period structural dynamics.