Groupwise Label Enhancement Broad Learning System for Image Classification

The broad learning system (BLS) is a lightweight neural network known for its efficient learning capabilities; however, it is limited by its reliance on a binary label strategy. Existing label enhancement models primarily focus on increasing the distances between labels from different classes, which inadvertently expands the distance within the same category. For classification tasks, maintaining similarity within the intraclass is essential for ensuring the model’s effectiveness. To address this issue, we propose a groupwise label enhancement BLS model that ensures both intraclass similarity and interclass disparity of labels. Specifically, we develop a novel regression target that generalizes existing label enhancement targets in BLS, increasing the distances between labels of different classes while overcoming the constraints imposed by binary labels. Moreover, we design a groupwise constraint to jointly enhance the intraclass similarity and interclass disparity of labels. Additionally, we propose a novel alternating direction method of multipliers-based optimization algorithm to solve our proposed model, ensuring both computational efficiency and theoretical convergence. Experimental results on several public datasets demonstrate the outstanding effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed model compared to other state-of-the-art methods.