aiqbench analysis
The paper proposes eCoMAE, a masked pretraining method for multivariate time series that uses evidential (Normal-Inverse-Gamma) outputs to tie predictive confidence to what the model actually observes. Reported gains on the IMPTC benchmark are modest (OOD accuracy 0.7971 to 0.8068, OOD AURC 0.0718 to 0.0648), and they come from a single benchmark plus trajectory-forecasting results across four datasets. Readers working on uncertainty estimation under distribution shift or on autonomous-driving perception should find the observability-aware consistency losses the most transferable idea.
Observability-Aligned Evidential Masked Pretraining for Reliable VRU Motion Prediction
arXiv:2610.39958v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Vulnerable road user (VRU) prediction must operate under partial observability and distribution shift, so reliable uncertainty matters alongside accuracy. Masked pretraining is attractive in this setting because it naturally exposes the model to missing content during self-supervision, but existing time-series masked autoencoding methods are typically deterministic and do not constrain how confidence should change with observability. We introduce eCoMAE, an evidential masked pretraining method for multivariate time series that explicitly aligns predictive evidence with what is observed. eCoMAE combines block-wise time-step masking with a Normal-Inverse-Gamma decoder and three observability-aware mechanisms: uncertainty-weighted mean consistency on positions visible in both a masked view and a reference pass, evidence suppression on masked positions, and representation consistency across stochastic masks. On IMPTC benchmark for VRU intention prediction under leave-one-environment-out weather shift, eCoMAE improves the strongest baseline from 0.7971 to 0.8068 in OOD accuracy and from 0.0718 to 0.0648 in OOD AURC. Additional evaluation on pedestrian trajectory forecasting across IMPTC, Waymo, nuScenes, and inD further yields the best fine-tuning MSE on all four datasets. These results show that observability-aligned evidential pretraining improves reliability under shift and remains effective beyond the primary benchmark.
Abstract:Vulnerable road user (VRU) prediction must operate under partial observability and distribution shift, so reliable uncertainty matters alongside accuracy. Masked pretraining is attractive in this setting because it naturally exposes the model to missing content during self-supervision, but existing time-series masked autoencoding methods are typically deterministic and do not constrain how confidence should change with observability. We introduce eCoMAE, an evidential masked pretraining method for multivariate time series that explicitly aligns predictive evidence with what is observed. eCoMAE combines block-wise time-step masking with a Normal-Inverse-Gamma decoder and three observability-aware mechanisms: uncertainty-weighted mean consistency on positions visible in both a masked view and a reference pass, evidence suppression on masked positions, and representation consistency across stochastic masks. On IMPTC benchmark for VRU intention prediction under leave-one-environment-out weather shift, eCoMAE improves the strongest baseline from 0.7971 to 0.8068 in OOD accuracy and from 0.0718 to 0.0648 in OOD AURC. Additional evaluation on pedestrian trajectory forecasting across IMPTC, Waymo, nuScenes, and inD further yields the best fine-tuning MSE on all four datasets. These results show that observability-aligned evidential pretraining improves reliability under shift and remains effective beyond the primary benchmark.
Machine Learning (cs.LG)
arXiv:2610.39958 [cs.LG]
(or arXiv:2610.39958v1 [cs.LG] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2610.39958 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)
arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website.
Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them.
Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs.
Full text under the publisher's open licence · 281 words