Model Interpretability and Rationale Extraction by Input Mask Optimization

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Hauptverfasser: Brinner, Marc, Zarriess, Sina
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Brinner, Marc
Zarriess, Sina
author_facet Brinner, Marc
Zarriess, Sina
contents Concurrent to the rapid progress in the development of neural-network based models in areas like natural language processing and computer vision, the need for creating explanations for the predictions of these black-box models has risen steadily. We propose a new method to generate extractive explanations for predictions made by neural networks, that is based on masking parts of the input which the model does not consider to be indicative of the respective class. The masking is done using gradient-based optimization combined with a new regularization scheme that enforces sufficiency, comprehensiveness and compactness of the generated explanation, three properties that are known to be desirable from the related field of rationale extraction in natural language processing. In this way, we bridge the gap between model interpretability and rationale extraction, thereby proving that the latter of which can be performed without training a specialized model, only on the basis of a trained classifier. We further apply the same method to image inputs and obtain high quality explanations for image classifications, which indicates that the conditions proposed for rationale extraction in natural language processing are more broadly applicable to different input types.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2508_11388
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Model Interpretability and Rationale Extraction by Input Mask Optimization
Brinner, Marc
Zarriess, Sina
Computation and Language
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Machine Learning
Concurrent to the rapid progress in the development of neural-network based models in areas like natural language processing and computer vision, the need for creating explanations for the predictions of these black-box models has risen steadily. We propose a new method to generate extractive explanations for predictions made by neural networks, that is based on masking parts of the input which the model does not consider to be indicative of the respective class. The masking is done using gradient-based optimization combined with a new regularization scheme that enforces sufficiency, comprehensiveness and compactness of the generated explanation, three properties that are known to be desirable from the related field of rationale extraction in natural language processing. In this way, we bridge the gap between model interpretability and rationale extraction, thereby proving that the latter of which can be performed without training a specialized model, only on the basis of a trained classifier. We further apply the same method to image inputs and obtain high quality explanations for image classifications, which indicates that the conditions proposed for rationale extraction in natural language processing are more broadly applicable to different input types.
title Model Interpretability and Rationale Extraction by Input Mask Optimization
topic Computation and Language
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.11388