English
Related papers

Related papers: Learning to Detect an Odd Markov Arm

200 papers

It is well known that in stochastic multi-armed bandits (MAB), the sample mean of an arm is typically not an unbiased estimator of its true mean. In this paper, we decouple three different sources of this selection bias: adaptive…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2019-10-29 Jaehyeok Shin , Aaditya Ramdas , Alessandro Rinaldo

In this paper we consider the contextual multi-armed bandit problem for linear payoffs under a risk-averse criterion. At each round, contexts are revealed for each arm, and the decision maker chooses one arm to pull and receives the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-06-28 Yifan Lin , Yuhao Wang , Enlu Zhou

In a typical stochastic multi-armed bandit problem, the objective is often to maximize the expected sum of rewards over some time horizon $T$. While the choice of a strategy that accomplishes that is optimal with no additional information,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-11-01 Reda Alami , Mohammed Mahfoud , Mastane Achab

Significant work has been recently dedicated to the stochastic delayed bandit setting because of its relevance in applications. The applicability of existing algorithms is however restricted by the fact that strong assumptions are often…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2020-06-19 Anne Gael Manegueu , Claire Vernade , Alexandra Carpentier , Michal Valko

We focus on the problem of best-arm identification in a stochastic multi-arm bandit with temporally decreasing variances for the arms' rewards. We model arm rewards as Gaussian random variables with fixed means and variances that decrease…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-02-12 Tamojeet Roychowdhury , Kota Srinivas Reddy , Krishna P Jagannathan , Sharayu Moharir

Recently multi-armed bandit problem arises in many real-life scenarios where arms must be sampled in batches, due to limited time the agent can wait for the feedback. Such applications include biological experimentation and online…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2023-12-22 Shengyu Cao , Simai He , Ruoqing Jiang , Jin Xu , Hongsong Yuan

We study the stochastic Multi-Armed Bandit (MAB) problem with random delays in the feedback received by the algorithm. We consider two settings: the reward-dependent delay setting, where realized delays may depend on the stochastic rewards,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-06-07 Tal Lancewicki , Shahar Segal , Tomer Koren , Yishay Mansour

We study the problem of covert online decision-making in which an agent attempts to identify a parameter governing a system by probing the system while escaping detection from an adversary. The system is modeled as a Markov kernel whose…

Information Theory · Computer Science 2023-11-22 Meng-Che Chang , Matthieu R. Bloch

We study a grouped bandit setting where each arm comprises multiple independent sub-arms referred to as attributes. Each attribute of each arm has an independent stochastic reward. We impose the constraint that for an arm to be deemed…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-12-12 Sahil Dharod , Malyala Preethi Sravani , Sakshi Heda , Sharayu Moharir

The 1-identification problem is a fundamental pure-exploration problem in multi-armed bandits. An agent aims to determine whether there exists an arm whose mean reward exceeds a known threshold $\mu_0$, or to output \textsf{None} otherwise.…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-05-15 Zitian Li , Wang Chi Cheung

We study the online restless bandit problem, where the state of each arm evolves according to a Markov chain, and the reward of pulling an arm depends on both the pulled arm and the current state of the corresponding Markov chain. In this…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-11-09 Siwei Wang , Longbo Huang , John C. S. Lui

In a linear stochastic bandit model, each arm is a vector in an Euclidean space and the observed return at each time step is an unknown linear function of the chosen arm at that time step. In this paper, we investigate the problem of…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-10-25 Qiyu Kang , Wee Peng Tay

We consider a multi-armed bandit problem where the decision maker can explore and exploit different arms at every round. The exploited arm adds to the decision maker's cumulative reward (without necessarily observing the reward) while the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2012-07-03 Orly Avner , Shie Mannor , Ohad Shamir

We study a variation of the classical multi-armed bandits problem. In this problem, the learner has to make a sequence of decisions, picking from a fixed set of choices. In each round, she receives as feedback only the loss incurred from…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2017-09-18 Paresh Nakhe , Rebecca Reiffenhäuser

Sampling from distributions to find the one with the largest mean arises in a broad range of applications, and it can be mathematically modeled as a multi-armed bandit problem in which each distribution is associated with an arm. This paper…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2013-06-18 Kevin Jamieson , Matthew Malloy , Robert Nowak , Sebastien Bubeck

Sequential decision-making under uncertainty often involves multiple agents learning which actions (arms) yield the highest rewards through repeated interaction with a stochastic environment. This setting is commonly modeled by cooperative…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2026-03-25 Evagoras Makridis , Themistoklis Charalambous

One of the key drivers of complexity in the classical (stochastic) multi-armed bandit (MAB) problem is the difference between mean rewards in the top two arms, also known as the instance gap. The celebrated Upper Confidence Bound (UCB)…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-10-27 Anand Kalvit , Assaf Zeevi

Motivated by clinical trials, we study bandits with observable non-compliance. At each step, the learner chooses an arm, after, instead of observing only the reward, it also observes the action that took place. We show that such…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2016-02-10 Nicolás Della Penna , Mark D. Reid , David Balduzzi

We consider a decision maker allocating one unit of renewable and divisible resource in each period on a number of arms. The arms have unknown and random rewards whose means are proportional to the allocated resource and whose variances are…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-11-06 Ningyuan Chen , Wenhao Li

Multi-armed bandit algorithms have been argued for decades as useful for adaptively randomized experiments. In such experiments, an algorithm varies which arms (e.g. alternative interventions to help students learn) are assigned to…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-03-29 Joseph Jay Williams , Jacob Nogas , Nina Deliu , Hammad Shaikh , Sofia S. Villar , Audrey Durand , Anna Rafferty