# Rethinking Feature Distribution for Loss Functions in Image Classification

Source: [Rethinking Feature Distribution for Loss Functions in Image Classification](<https://www.sota2.com/research/paper/68fa64291e209131cea03016>)

Collection index: [llms.txt](<https://www.sota2.com/research/llms.txt>)

Data updated: 2025-10-25T20:57:11.341Z

Authors: Weitao Wan, Yuanyi Zhong, Tianpeng Li, Jiansheng Chen

Published: 2018-03-08T07:28:55.000Z

## Abstract

We propose a large-margin Gaussian Mixture (L-GM) loss for deep neural networks in classification tasks. Different from the softmax cross-entropy loss, our proposal is established on the assumption that the deep features of the training set follow a Gaussian Mixture distribution. By involving a classification margin and a likelihood regularization, the L-GM loss facilitates both a high classification performance and an accurate modeling of the training feature distribution. As such, the L-GM loss is superior to the softmax loss and its major variants in the sense that besides classification, it can be readily used to distinguish abnormal inputs, such as the adversarial examples, based on their features' likelihood to the training feature distribution. Extensive experiments on various recognition benchmarks like MNIST, CIFAR, ImageNet and LFW, as well as on adversarial examples demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposal.

## Recorded benchmark results

A research result applies to its stated dataset, split, metric and evaluation configuration. Compare like-for-like settings, preserve the metric's unit and direction, and distinguish paper-reported results from independent reproduction. The best result recorded here is not a claim of exhaustive, current global coverage.

## Original sources and implementation

[Original paper](<https://arxiv.org/abs/1803.02988>)

[PDF](<https://arxiv.org/pdf/1803.02988.pdf>)
