## Bernoulli

• Bernoulli
• Volume 20, Number 3 (2014), 1647-1671.

### Feature selection when there are many influential features

#### Abstract

Recent discussion of the success of feature selection methods has argued that focusing on a relatively small number of features has been counterproductive. Instead, it is suggested, the number of significant features can be in the thousands or tens of thousands, rather than (as is commonly supposed at present) approximately in the range from five to fifty. This change, in orders of magnitude, in the number of influential features, necessitates alterations to the way in which we choose features and to the manner in which the success of feature selection is assessed. In this paper, we suggest a general approach that is suited to cases where the number of relevant features is very large, and we consider particular versions of the approach in detail. We propose ways of measuring performance, and we study both theoretical and numerical properties of the proposed methodology.

#### Article information

Source
Bernoulli Volume 20, Number 3 (2014), 1647-1671.

Dates
First available in Project Euclid: 11 June 2014

https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.bj/1402488953

Digital Object Identifier
doi:10.3150/13-BEJ536

Mathematical Reviews number (MathSciNet)
MR3217457

Zentralblatt MATH identifier
06327922

#### Citation

Hall, Peter; Jin, Jiashun; Miller, Hugh. Feature selection when there are many influential features. Bernoulli 20 (2014), no. 3, 1647--1671. doi:10.3150/13-BEJ536. https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.bj/1402488953

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