Gender Fairness of Machine Learning Algorithms for Pain Detection

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Green, Dylan, Shang, Yuting, Cheong, Jiaee, Liu, Yang, Gunes, Hatice
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
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author Green, Dylan
Shang, Yuting
Cheong, Jiaee
Liu, Yang
Gunes, Hatice
author_facet Green, Dylan
Shang, Yuting
Cheong, Jiaee
Liu, Yang
Gunes, Hatice
contents Automated pain detection through machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) algorithms holds significant potential in healthcare, particularly for patients unable to self-report pain levels. However, the accuracy and fairness of these algorithms across different demographic groups (e.g., gender) remain under-researched. This paper investigates the gender fairness of ML and DL models trained on the UNBC-McMaster Shoulder Pain Expression Archive Database, evaluating the performance of various models in detecting pain based solely on the visual modality of participants' facial expressions. We compare traditional ML algorithms, Linear Support Vector Machine (L SVM) and Radial Basis Function SVM (RBF SVM), with DL methods, Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) and Vision Transformer (ViT), using a range of performance and fairness metrics. While ViT achieved the highest accuracy and a selection of fairness metrics, all models exhibited gender-based biases. These findings highlight the persistent trade-off between accuracy and fairness, emphasising the need for fairness-aware techniques to mitigate biases in automated healthcare systems.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_11132
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Gender Fairness of Machine Learning Algorithms for Pain Detection
Green, Dylan
Shang, Yuting
Cheong, Jiaee
Liu, Yang
Gunes, Hatice
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Machine Learning
Automated pain detection through machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) algorithms holds significant potential in healthcare, particularly for patients unable to self-report pain levels. However, the accuracy and fairness of these algorithms across different demographic groups (e.g., gender) remain under-researched. This paper investigates the gender fairness of ML and DL models trained on the UNBC-McMaster Shoulder Pain Expression Archive Database, evaluating the performance of various models in detecting pain based solely on the visual modality of participants' facial expressions. We compare traditional ML algorithms, Linear Support Vector Machine (L SVM) and Radial Basis Function SVM (RBF SVM), with DL methods, Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) and Vision Transformer (ViT), using a range of performance and fairness metrics. While ViT achieved the highest accuracy and a selection of fairness metrics, all models exhibited gender-based biases. These findings highlight the persistent trade-off between accuracy and fairness, emphasising the need for fairness-aware techniques to mitigate biases in automated healthcare systems.
title Gender Fairness of Machine Learning Algorithms for Pain Detection
topic Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.11132