Label ranking through nonparametric regression
Published in Thirty-ninth International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML 2022), 2022
Label Ranking (LR) corresponds to the problem of learning a hypothesis that maps features to rankings over a finite set of labels. We adopt a nonparametric regression approach to LR and obtain theoretical performance guarantees for this fundamental practical problem. We introduce a generative model for Label Ranking, in noiseless and noisy nonparametric regression settings, and provide sample complexity bounds for learning algorithms in both cases. In the noiseless setting, we study the LR problem with full rankings and provide computationally efficient algorithms using decision trees and random forests in the high-dimensional regime. In the noisy setting, we consider the more general cases of LR with incomplete and partial rankings from a statistical viewpoint and obtain sample complexity bounds using the One-Versus-One approach of multiclass classification. Finally, we complement our theoretical contributions with experiments, aiming to understand how the input regression noise affects the observed output.
Recommended citation: Fotakis, D., Kalavasis, A. & Psaroudaki, E.. (2022). Label Ranking through Nonparametric Regression. Proceedings of the 39th International Conference on Machine Learning, in Proceedings of Machine Learning Research 162:6622-6659 Available from https://proceedings.mlr.press/v162/fotakis22a.html.
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