Papers for

healthcare access managers

Papers whose findings have a practical use for this group, as judged from the abstract. Open a paper to read what it means in practice.

Algorithmic recourse faces challenges when many compete for limited resources

Algorithmic Recourse Under Competition

Abstract: Algorithmic recourse provides individuals who have received undesirable outcomes from machine learning models with suggestions for minimum-cost improvements to achieve the desired outcome. A central assumption when computing recourse is that the decision rule remains fixed throughout the recourse implementation phase. We challenge this assumption in settings where individuals compete for limited resources. In such settings, widespread recourse implementation can change the acceptance threshold even when the scoring model that is used to evaluate individuals remains the same. This change in acceptance threshold can, in turn, invalidate the original recourse recommendations (i.e., following the recourse may not lead to the desired outcome). To address this problem, we introduce a framework called recourse under competition that jointly optimizes for recommendation recipients and the recommended score target they need to satisfy to balance the recourse cost and post-shift validity among initially rejected individuals. We develop an algorithm based on the Implicit Function Theorem and empirically analyze its performance. Experiments on synthetic and real datasets show that personalized score targets can achieve higher validity, albeit at a higher cost. In contrast, common score targets generally offer favorable cost-validity trade-offs for lower to medium validity values.

Wed 30 SeptMachine LearningArtificial Intelligence
The gist
Sometimes computers decide who gets something, like a loan, and people want advice on how to improve their chances if denied. Usually, this advice assumes the decision rules don’t change, but when many people try to improve at once, the rules shift, making the advice less useful. The authors studied this problem and created a method that gives advice tailored to both the person and how competition changes the rules. They tested this approach on fake and real data, finding personalized goals can increase success but cost more effort.
Open → 2609.39877v1