A Characterization of Prediction Errors

Understanding prediction errors and determining how to fix them is critical to building effective predictive systems. In this paper, we delineate four types of prediction errors (mislabeling, representation, learner and boundary errors) and demonstrate that these four types characterize all prediction errors. In addition, we describe potential remedies and tools that can be used to reduce the uncertainty when trying to determine the source of a prediction error and when trying to take action to remove a prediction error.