TITLE: Evaluating Model Robustness and Stability to Dataset Shift 

ABSTRACT: As the use of machine learning in high impact domains becomes widespread, the
importance of evaluating safety has increased. An important aspect of this is
evaluating how robust a model is to changes in setting or population, which
typically requires applying the model to multiple, independent datasets. Since
the cost of collecting such datasets is often prohibitive, in this paper, we
propose a framework for analyzing this type of stability using the available
data. We use the original evaluation data to determine distributions under
which the algorithm performs poorly, and estimate the algorithm's performance
on the "worst-case" distribution. We consider shifts in user defined
conditional distributions, allowing some distributions to shift while keeping
other portions of the data distribution fixed. For example, in a healthcare
context, this allows us to consider shifts in clinical practice while keeping
the patient population fixed. To address the challenges associated with
estimation in complex, high-dimensional distributions, we derive a "debiased"
estimator which maintains $\sqrt{N}$-consistency even when machine learning
methods with slower convergence rates are used to estimate the nuisance
parameters. In experiments on a real medical risk prediction task, we show this
estimator can be used to analyze stability and accounts for realistic shifts
that could not previously be expressed. The proposed framework allows
practitioners to proactively evaluate the safety of their models without
requiring additional data collection.
As the use of machine learning in high impact domains becomes widespread, the
importance of evaluating safety has increased. An important aspect of this is
evaluating how robust a model is to changes in setting or population, which
typically requires applying the model to multiple, independent datasets. Since
the cost of collecting such datasets is often prohibitive, in this paper, we
propose a framework for analyzing this type of stability using the available
data. We use the original evaluation data to determine distributions under
which the algorithm performs poorly, and estimate the algorithm's performance
on the "worst-case" distribution. We consider shifts in user defined
conditional distributions, allowing some distributions to shift while keeping
other portions of the data distribution fixed. For example, in a healthcare
context, this allows us to consider shifts in clinical practice while keeping
the patient population fixed. To address the challenges associated with
estimation in complex, high-dimensional distributions, we derive a "debiased"
estimator which maintains $\sqrt{N}$-consistency even when machine learning
methods with slower convergence rates are used to estimate the nuisance
parameters. In experiments on a real medical risk prediction task, we show this
estimator can be used to analyze stability and accounts for realistic shifts
that could not previously be expressed. The proposed framework allows
practitioners to proactively evaluate the safety of their models without
requiring additional data collection.
Evaluating Model Robustness and Stability to Dataset Shift
http://arxiv.org/abs/2010.15100v2