Counterfactual experience augmented off-policy reinforcement learning

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Lee, Sunbowen, Gong, Yicheng, Deng, Chao
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Lee, Sunbowen
Gong, Yicheng
Deng, Chao
author_facet Lee, Sunbowen
Gong, Yicheng
Deng, Chao
contents Reinforcement learning control algorithms face significant challenges due to out-of-distribution and inefficient exploration problems. While model-based reinforcement learning enhances the agent's reasoning and planning capabilities by constructing virtual environments, training such virtual environments can be very complex. In order to build an efficient inference model and enhance the representativeness of learning data, we propose the Counterfactual Experience Augmentation (CEA) algorithm. CEA leverages variational autoencoders to model the dynamic patterns of state transitions and introduces randomness to model non-stationarity. This approach focuses on expanding the learning data in the experience pool through counterfactual inference and performs exceptionally well in environments that follow the bisimulation assumption. Environments with bisimulation properties are usually represented by discrete observation and action spaces, we propose a sampling method based on maximum kernel density estimation entropy to extend CEA to various environments. By providing reward signals for counterfactual state transitions based on real information, CEA constructs a complete counterfactual experience to alleviate the out-of-distribution problem of the learning data, and outperforms general SOTA algorithms in environments with difference properties. Finally, we discuss the similarities, differences and properties of generated counterfactual experiences and real experiences. The code is available at https://github.com/Aegis1863/CEA.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2503_13842
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Counterfactual experience augmented off-policy reinforcement learning
Lee, Sunbowen
Gong, Yicheng
Deng, Chao
Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
Reinforcement learning control algorithms face significant challenges due to out-of-distribution and inefficient exploration problems. While model-based reinforcement learning enhances the agent's reasoning and planning capabilities by constructing virtual environments, training such virtual environments can be very complex. In order to build an efficient inference model and enhance the representativeness of learning data, we propose the Counterfactual Experience Augmentation (CEA) algorithm. CEA leverages variational autoencoders to model the dynamic patterns of state transitions and introduces randomness to model non-stationarity. This approach focuses on expanding the learning data in the experience pool through counterfactual inference and performs exceptionally well in environments that follow the bisimulation assumption. Environments with bisimulation properties are usually represented by discrete observation and action spaces, we propose a sampling method based on maximum kernel density estimation entropy to extend CEA to various environments. By providing reward signals for counterfactual state transitions based on real information, CEA constructs a complete counterfactual experience to alleviate the out-of-distribution problem of the learning data, and outperforms general SOTA algorithms in environments with difference properties. Finally, we discuss the similarities, differences and properties of generated counterfactual experiences and real experiences. The code is available at https://github.com/Aegis1863/CEA.
title Counterfactual experience augmented off-policy reinforcement learning
topic Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.13842