Transfer Learning in Natural Language Processing through Interactive Feedback

Simple item page
dc.contributor.advisorBoyd-Graber, Jordanen_US
dc.contributor.authorYuan, Michelleen_US
dc.contributor.departmentComputer Scienceen_US
dc.contributor.publisherDigital Repository at the University of Marylanden_US
dc.contributor.publisherUniversity of Maryland (College Park, Md.)en_US
dc.date.accessioned2022-09-27T05:38:19Z
dc.date.available2022-09-27T05:38:19Z
dc.date.issued2022en_US
dc.description.abstractMachine learning models cannot easily adapt to new domains and applications. This drawback becomes detrimental for natural language processing (NLP) because language is perpetually changing. Across disciplines and languages, there are noticeable differences in content, grammar, and vocabulary. To overcome these shifts, recent NLP breakthroughs focus on transfer learning. Through clever optimization and engineering, a model can successfully adapt to a new domain or task. However, these modifications are still computationally inefficient or resource-intensive. Compared to machines, humans are more capable at generalizing knowledge across different situations, especially in low-resource ones. Therefore, the research on transfer learning should carefully consider how the user interacts with the model. The goal of this dissertation is to investigate “human-in-the-loop” approaches for transfer learning in NLP. First, we design annotation frameworks for inductive transfer learning, which is the transfer of models across tasks. We create an interactive topic modeling system for users to find topics useful for classifying documents in multiple languages. The user-constructed topic model bridges improves classification accuracy and bridges cross-lingual gaps in knowledge. Next, we look at popular language models, like BERT, that can be applied to various tasks. While these models are useful, they still require a large amount of labeled data to learn a new task. To reduce labeling, we develop an active learning strategy which samples documents that surprise the language model. Users only need to annotate a small subset of these unexpected documents to adapt the language model for text classification. Then, we transition to user interaction in transductive transfer learning, which is the transfer of models across domains. We focus our efforts on low-resource languages to develop an interactive system for word embeddings. In this approach, the feedback from bilingual speakers refines the cross-lingual embedding space for classification tasks. Subsequently, we look at domain shift for tasks beyond text classification. Coreference resolution is fundamental for NLP applications, like question-answering and dialogue, but the models are typically trained and evaluated on one dataset. We use active learning to find spans of text in the new domain for users to label. Furthermore, we provide important insights on annotating spans for domain adaptation. Finally, we summarize the contributions of each chapter. We focus on aspects like the scope of applications and model complexity. We conclude with a discussion of future directions. Researchers may extend the ideas in our thesis to topics like user-centric active learning and proactive learning.en_US
dc.identifierhttps://doi.org/10.13016/4ukl-4hqa
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/29333
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.subject.pqcontrolledArtificial intelligenceen_US
dc.subject.pqcontrolledComputer scienceen_US
dc.subject.pqcontrolledLanguageen_US
dc.subject.pquncontrolledAIen_US
dc.subject.pquncontrolledartificial intelligenceen_US
dc.subject.pquncontrolledmachine learningen_US
dc.subject.pquncontrollednatural language processingen_US
dc.subject.pquncontrolledNLPen_US
dc.titleTransfer Learning in Natural Language Processing through Interactive Feedbacken_US
dc.typeDissertationen_US

Files

Original bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Thumbnail Image
Name:
Yuan_umd_0117E_22783.pdf
Size:
13.06 MB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Download

Collections

UMD Theses and Dissertations
Computer Science Theses and Dissertations