Conditional Mutual Information-Based Generalization Bound for Meta Learning

Arezou Rezazadeh, Sharu Theresa Jose, Giuseppe Durisi, Osvaldo Simeone

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

Abstract

Meta-learning optimizes an inductive bias - typically in the form of the hyperparameters of a base-learning algorithm - by observing data from a finite number of related tasks. This paper presents an information-theoretic bound on the generalization performance of any given meta-learner, which builds on the conditional mutual information (CMI) framework of Steinke and Zakynthinou (2020). In the proposed extension to meta-learning, the CMI bound involves a training meta-supersample obtained by first sampling 2N independent tasks from the task environment, and then drawing 2M independent training samples for each sampled task. The meta-training data fed to the meta-learner is modelled as being obtained by randomly selecting N tasks from the available 2N tasks and M training samples per task from the available 2M training samples per task. The resulting bound is explicit in two CMI terms, which measure the information that the meta-learner output and the base-learner output provide about which training data are selected, given the entire meta-supersample. Finally, we present a numerical example that illustrates the merits of the proposed bound in comparison to prior information-theoretic bounds for meta-learning.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publication2021 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory, ISIT 2021 - Proceedings
PublisherInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
Pages1176-1181
Number of pages6
ISBN (Electronic)9781538682098
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 12 2021
Externally publishedYes
Event2021 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory, ISIT 2021 - Virtual, Melbourne, Australia
Duration: Jul 12 2021Jul 20 2021

Publication series

NameIEEE International Symposium on Information Theory - Proceedings
Volume2021-July
ISSN (Print)2157-8095

Conference

Conference2021 IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory, ISIT 2021
Country/TerritoryAustralia
CityVirtual, Melbourne
Period7/12/217/20/21

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Theoretical Computer Science
  • Information Systems
  • Modeling and Simulation
  • Applied Mathematics

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