Interpretable Hierarchical Concept Reasoning through Attention-Guided Graph Learning

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Debot, David, Barbiero, Pietro, Dominici, Gabriele, Marra, Giuseppe
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2025
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author Debot, David
Barbiero, Pietro
Dominici, Gabriele
Marra, Giuseppe
author_facet Debot, David
Barbiero, Pietro
Dominici, Gabriele
Marra, Giuseppe
contents Concept-Based Models (CBMs) are a class of deep learning models that provide interpretability by explaining predictions through high-level concepts. These models first predict concepts and then use them to perform a downstream task. However, current CBMs offer interpretability only for the final task prediction, while the concept predictions themselves are typically made via black-box neural networks. To address this limitation, we propose Hierarchical Concept Memory Reasoner (H-CMR), a new CBM that provides interpretability for both concept and task predictions. H-CMR models relationships between concepts using a learned directed acyclic graph, where edges represent logic rules that define concepts in terms of other concepts. During inference, H-CMR employs a neural attention mechanism to select a subset of these rules, which are then applied hierarchically to predict all concepts and the final task. Experimental results demonstrate that H-CMR matches state-of-the-art performance while enabling strong human interaction through concept and model interventions. The former can significantly improve accuracy at inference time, while the latter can enhance data efficiency during training when background knowledge is available.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_21102
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Interpretable Hierarchical Concept Reasoning through Attention-Guided Graph Learning
Debot, David
Barbiero, Pietro
Dominici, Gabriele
Marra, Giuseppe
Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
Concept-Based Models (CBMs) are a class of deep learning models that provide interpretability by explaining predictions through high-level concepts. These models first predict concepts and then use them to perform a downstream task. However, current CBMs offer interpretability only for the final task prediction, while the concept predictions themselves are typically made via black-box neural networks. To address this limitation, we propose Hierarchical Concept Memory Reasoner (H-CMR), a new CBM that provides interpretability for both concept and task predictions. H-CMR models relationships between concepts using a learned directed acyclic graph, where edges represent logic rules that define concepts in terms of other concepts. During inference, H-CMR employs a neural attention mechanism to select a subset of these rules, which are then applied hierarchically to predict all concepts and the final task. Experimental results demonstrate that H-CMR matches state-of-the-art performance while enabling strong human interaction through concept and model interventions. The former can significantly improve accuracy at inference time, while the latter can enhance data efficiency during training when background knowledge is available.
title Interpretable Hierarchical Concept Reasoning through Attention-Guided Graph Learning
topic Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.21102