Generalized Label Propagation Methods for Semi-Supervised Learning

Qimai Li, Xiao-Ming Wu, Zhichao Guan.

Abstract: The key challenge in semi-supervised learning is how to effectively leverage unlabeled data to improve learning performance. The classical label propagation method, despite its popularity, has limited modeling capability in that it only exploits graph information for making predictions. In this paper, we consider label propagation from a graph signal processing perspective and decompose it into three components: signal, filter, and classifier. By extending the three components, we propose a simple generalized label propagation (GLP) framework for semi-supervised learning. GLP naturally integrates graph and data feature information, and offers the flexibility of selecting appropriate filters and domain-specific classifiers for different applications. Interestingly, GLP also provides new insight into the popular graph convolutional network and elucidates its working mechanisms. Extensive experiments on three citation networks, one knowledge graph, and one image dataset demonstrate the efficiency and effectiveness of GLP.

Keywords: semi-supervised learning, label propagation, graph convolutional networks

TL;DR: We extend the classical label propation methods to jointly model graph and feature information from a graph filtering perspective, and show connections to the graph convlutional networks.

Community Implementations: [ 1 code implementation](https://www.catalyzex.com/paper/arxiv:1901.09993/code)