Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering

While deep neural networks demonstrate robust performance in visual tasks, the long-tail distribution of real-world data leads to significant recognition accuracy degradation in critical scenarios such as medical human–robot affective interaction, particularly the misidentification of low-frequency...

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Main Authors: Qingdu Li, Keting Fu, Jian Liu, Yishan Li, Qinze Ren, Kang Xu, Junxiu Fu, Na Liu, Ye Yuan
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-05-01
Series:Biomimetics
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Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2313-7673/10/5/296
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author Qingdu Li
Keting Fu
Jian Liu
Yishan Li
Qinze Ren
Kang Xu
Junxiu Fu
Na Liu
Ye Yuan
author_facet Qingdu Li
Keting Fu
Jian Liu
Yishan Li
Qinze Ren
Kang Xu
Junxiu Fu
Na Liu
Ye Yuan
author_sort Qingdu Li
collection DOAJ
description While deep neural networks demonstrate robust performance in visual tasks, the long-tail distribution of real-world data leads to significant recognition accuracy degradation in critical scenarios such as medical human–robot affective interaction, particularly the misidentification of low-frequency negative emotions (e.g., fear and disgust) that may trigger psychological resistance in patients. Here, we propose a method based on dynamic intra-class clustering (DICC) to optimize the class imbalance problem in facial expression recognition tasks. The DICC method dynamically adjusts the distribution of majority classes by clustering them into subclasses and generating pseudo-labels, which helps the model learn more discriminative features and improve classification accuracy. By comparing with existing methods, we demonstrate that the DICC method can help the model achieve superior performance across various facial expression datasets. In this study, we conducted an in-depth evaluation of the DICC method against baseline methods using the FER2013, MMAFEDB, and Emotion-Domestic datasets, achieving improvements in classification accuracy of 1.73%, 1.97%, and 5.48%, respectively. This indicates that the DICC method can effectively enhance classification precision, especially in the recognition of minority class samples. This approach provides a novel perspective for addressing the class imbalance challenge in facial expression recognition and offers a reference for future research and applications in related fields.
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spelling doaj-art-acf09dc29ca54d8f858cb4aead6999df2025-08-20T03:47:52ZengMDPI AGBiomimetics2313-76732025-05-0110529610.3390/biomimetics10050296Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class ClusteringQingdu Li0Keting Fu1Jian Liu2Yishan Li3Qinze Ren4Kang Xu5Junxiu Fu6Na Liu7Ye Yuan8Institute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaSchool of Optoelectronic Information and Computer Engineering, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaInstitute of Machine Intelligence, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, ChinaWhile deep neural networks demonstrate robust performance in visual tasks, the long-tail distribution of real-world data leads to significant recognition accuracy degradation in critical scenarios such as medical human–robot affective interaction, particularly the misidentification of low-frequency negative emotions (e.g., fear and disgust) that may trigger psychological resistance in patients. Here, we propose a method based on dynamic intra-class clustering (DICC) to optimize the class imbalance problem in facial expression recognition tasks. The DICC method dynamically adjusts the distribution of majority classes by clustering them into subclasses and generating pseudo-labels, which helps the model learn more discriminative features and improve classification accuracy. By comparing with existing methods, we demonstrate that the DICC method can help the model achieve superior performance across various facial expression datasets. In this study, we conducted an in-depth evaluation of the DICC method against baseline methods using the FER2013, MMAFEDB, and Emotion-Domestic datasets, achieving improvements in classification accuracy of 1.73%, 1.97%, and 5.48%, respectively. This indicates that the DICC method can effectively enhance classification precision, especially in the recognition of minority class samples. This approach provides a novel perspective for addressing the class imbalance challenge in facial expression recognition and offers a reference for future research and applications in related fields.https://www.mdpi.com/2313-7673/10/5/296facial expression recognitionclass imbalancedynamic intra-class clustering algorithmdeep learning
spellingShingle Qingdu Li
Keting Fu
Jian Liu
Yishan Li
Qinze Ren
Kang Xu
Junxiu Fu
Na Liu
Ye Yuan
Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering
Biomimetics
facial expression recognition
class imbalance
dynamic intra-class clustering algorithm
deep learning
title Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering
title_full Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering
title_fullStr Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering
title_full_unstemmed Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering
title_short Optimizing Class Imbalance in Facial Expression Recognition Using Dynamic Intra-Class Clustering
title_sort optimizing class imbalance in facial expression recognition using dynamic intra class clustering
topic facial expression recognition
class imbalance
dynamic intra-class clustering algorithm
deep learning
url https://www.mdpi.com/2313-7673/10/5/296
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