Effects of Training Data Quality on Classifier Performance

Fuente: arXiv
Guardado en:
Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Karr, Alan F., Ruane, Regina
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2026
Materias:
Acceso en línea:
Etiquetas: Agregar Etiqueta
Sin Etiquetas, Sea el primero en etiquetar este registro!
_version_ 1866915815569227776
author Karr, Alan F.
Ruane, Regina
author_facet Karr, Alan F.
Ruane, Regina
contents We describe extensive numerical experiments assessing and quantifying how classifier performance depends on the quality of the training data, a frequently neglected component of the analysis of classifiers. More specifically, in the scientific context of metagenomic assembly of short DNA reads into "contigs," we examine the effects of degrading the quality of the training data by multiple mechanisms, and for four classifiers -- Bayes classifiers, neural nets, partition models and random forests. We investigate both individual behavior and congruence among the classifiers. We find breakdown-like behavior that holds for all four classifiers, as degradation increases and they move from being mostly correct to only coincidentally correct, because they are wrong in the same way. In the process, a picture of spatial heterogeneity emerges: as the training data move farther from analysis data, classifier decisions degenerate, the boundary becomes less dense, and congruence increases.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_21462
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Effects of Training Data Quality on Classifier Performance
Karr, Alan F.
Ruane, Regina
Machine Learning
Genomics
We describe extensive numerical experiments assessing and quantifying how classifier performance depends on the quality of the training data, a frequently neglected component of the analysis of classifiers. More specifically, in the scientific context of metagenomic assembly of short DNA reads into "contigs," we examine the effects of degrading the quality of the training data by multiple mechanisms, and for four classifiers -- Bayes classifiers, neural nets, partition models and random forests. We investigate both individual behavior and congruence among the classifiers. We find breakdown-like behavior that holds for all four classifiers, as degradation increases and they move from being mostly correct to only coincidentally correct, because they are wrong in the same way. In the process, a picture of spatial heterogeneity emerges: as the training data move farther from analysis data, classifier decisions degenerate, the boundary becomes less dense, and congruence increases.
title Effects of Training Data Quality on Classifier Performance
topic Machine Learning
Genomics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.21462