FairTTTS: A Tree Test Time Simulation Method for Fairness-Aware Classification

TL;DR

FairTTTS is a post-processing method that improves fairness and accuracy in classification models by adjusting decisions at protected attribute nodes, without retraining, based on a novel tree simulation technique.

Contribution

It introduces FairTTTS, a novel post-processing bias mitigation method leveraging Tree Test Time Simulation to enhance fairness and accuracy simultaneously.

Findings

Outperforms traditional fairness methods with a 20.96% average fairness increase.

Achieves a 0.55% improvement in predictive accuracy.

Maintains applicability across diverse datasets and fairness metrics.

Abstract

Algorithmic decision-making has become deeply ingrained in many domains, yet biases in machine learning models can still produce discriminatory outcomes, often harming unprivileged groups. Achieving fair classification is inherently challenging, requiring a careful balance between predictive performance and ethical considerations. We present FairTTTS, a novel post-processing bias mitigation method inspired by the Tree Test Time Simulation (TTTS) method. Originally developed to enhance accuracy and robustness against adversarial inputs through probabilistic decision-path adjustments, TTTS serves as the foundation for FairTTTS. By building on this accuracy-enhancing technique, FairTTTS mitigates bias and improves predictive performance. FairTTTS uses a distance-based heuristic to adjust decisions at protected attribute nodes, ensuring fairness for unprivileged samples. This fairness-oriented adjustment occurs as a post-processing step, allowing FairTTTS to be applied to pre-trained models, diverse datasets, and various fairness metrics without retraining. Extensive evaluation on seven benchmark datasets shows that FairTTTS outperforms traditional methods in fairness improvement, achieving a 20.96% average increase over the baseline compared to 18.78% for related work, and further enhances accuracy by 0.55%. In contrast, competing methods typically reduce accuracy by 0.42%. These results confirm that FairTTTS effectively promotes more equitable decision-making while simultaneously improving predictive performance.