ICML 2021spotlight76 citations

Self-Tuning for Data-Efficient Deep Learning

Ximei Wang, Jinghan Gao, Mingsheng Long, Jianmin Wang

Abstract

Deep learning has made revolutionary advances to diverse applications in the presence of large-scale labeled datasets. However, it is prohibitively time-costly and labor-expensive to collect sufficient labeled data in most realistic scenarios. To mitigate the requirement for labeled data, semi-supervised learning (SSL) focuses on simultaneously exploring both labeled and unlabeled data, while transfer learning (TL) popularizes a favorable practice of fine-tuning a pre-trained model to the target data. A dilemma is thus encountered: Without a decent pre-trained model to provide an implicit regularization, SSL through self-training from scratch will be easily misled by inaccurate pseudo-labels, especially in large-sized label space; Without exploring the intrinsic structure of unlabeled data, TL through fine-tuning from limited labeled data is at risk of under-transfer caused by model shift. To escape from this dilemma, we present Self-Tuning to enable data-efficient deep learning by unifying the exploration of labeled and unlabeled data and the transfer of a pre-trained model, as well as a Pseudo Group Contrast (PGC) mechanism to mitigate the reliance on pseudo-labels and boost the tolerance to false labels. Self-Tuning outperforms its SSL and TL counterparts on five tasks by sharp margins, e.g. it doubles the accuracy of fine-tuning on Cars with $15%$ labels.

BibTeX
@InProceedings{pmlr-v139-wang21g,
  title = 	 {Self-Tuning for Data-Efficient Deep Learning},
  author =       {Wang, Ximei and Gao, Jinghan and Long, Mingsheng and Wang, Jianmin},
  booktitle = 	 {Proceedings of the 38th International Conference on Machine Learning},
  pages = 	 {10738--10748},
  year = 	 {2021},
  editor = 	 {Meila, Marina and Zhang, Tong},
  volume = 	 {139},
  series = 	 {Proceedings of Machine Learning Research},
  month = 	 {18--24 Jul},
  publisher =    {PMLR},
  pdf = 	 {http://proceedings.mlr.press/v139/wang21g/wang21g.pdf},
  url = 	 {https://proceedings.mlr.press/v139/wang21g.html},
  abstract = 	 {Deep learning has made revolutionary advances to diverse applications in the presence of large-scale labeled datasets. However, it is prohibitively time-costly and labor-expensive to collect sufficient labeled data in most realistic scenarios. To mitigate the requirement for labeled data, semi-supervised learning (SSL) focuses on simultaneously exploring both labeled and unlabeled data, while transfer learning (TL) popularizes a favorable practice of fine-tuning a pre-trained model to the target data. A dilemma is thus encountered: Without a decent pre-trained model to provide an implicit regularization, SSL through self-training from scratch will be easily misled by inaccurate pseudo-labels, especially in large-sized label space; Without exploring the intrinsic structure of unlabeled data, TL through fine-tuning from limited labeled data is at risk of under-transfer caused by model shift. To escape from this dilemma, we present Self-Tuning to enable data-efficient deep learning by unifying the exploration of labeled and unlabeled data and the transfer of a pre-trained model, as well as a Pseudo Group Contrast (PGC) mechanism to mitigate the reliance on pseudo-labels and boost the tolerance to false labels. Self-Tuning outperforms its SSL and TL counterparts on five tasks by sharp margins, e.g. it doubles the accuracy of fine-tuning on Cars with $15%$ labels.}
}