# Towards Plastic and Stable Exemplar-Free Incremental Learning: A Dual-Learner Framework with Cumulative Parameter Averaging

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2310.18639 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.18639/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 38 of its 56 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 28 Oct 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 38)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [A Simple Framework for Contrastive Learning of Visual Representations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.05709/) (2020)
- [Momentum Contrast for Unsupervised Visual Representation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.05722/) (2019)
- [Overcoming catastrophic forgetting in neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.00796/) (2016)
- [Bootstrap your own latent: A new approach to self-supervised Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.07733/) (2020)
- [Learning without Forgetting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.09282/) (2016)
- [Gradient Episodic Memory for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.08840/) (2017)
- [Progressive Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.04671/) (2016)
- [Continual Learning with Deep Generative Replay](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1705.08690/) (2017)
- [Memory Aware Synapses: Learning what (not) to forget](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1711.09601/) (2017)
- [Dark Experience for General Continual Learning: a Strong, Simple Baseline](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.07211/) (2020)
- [PackNet: Adding Multiple Tasks to a Single Network by Iterative Pruning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1711.05769/) (2017)
- [Large Scale Incremental Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1905.13260/) (2019)
- [Self-supervised Visual Feature Learning with Deep Neural Networks: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1902.06162/) (2019)
- [Three scenarios for continual learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.07734/) (2019)
- [Class-incremental learning: survey and performance evaluation on image classification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.15277/) (2020)
- [Dreaming to Distill: Data-free Knowledge Transfer via DeepInversion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.08795/) (2019)
- [Gradient Projection Memory for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.09762/) (2021)
- [Online Continual Learning in Image Classification: An Empirical Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2101.10423/) (2021)
- [Co2L: Contrastive Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.14413/) (2021)
- [Class-Incremental Learning: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.03648/) (2023)
- [Compacting, Picking and Growing for Unforgetting Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1910.06562/) (2019)
- [Continual Learning of Context-dependent Processing in Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.01256/) (2018)
- [Using Hindsight to Anchor Past Knowledge in Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.08165/) (2020)
- [Self-Supervised Models are Continual Learners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.04215/) (2021)
- [Linear Mode Connectivity in Multitask and Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.04495/) (2020)
- [Training Networks in Null Space of Feature Covariance for Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.07113/) (2021)
- [Always Be Dreaming: A New Approach for Data-Free Class-Incremental Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.09701/) (2021)
- [Scalable and Order-robust Continual Learning with Additive Parameter Decomposition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1902.09432/) (2019)
- [Class-Incremental Learning by Knowledge Distillation with Adaptive Feature Consolidation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.00895/) (2022)

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [Task Arithmetic in Trust Region: A Training-Free Model Merging Approach to Navigate Knowledge Conflicts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.15065/) (2025)
- [DESIRE: Dynamic Knowledge Consolidation for Rehearsal-Free Continual Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.19154/) (2024)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The dilemma between plasticity and stability presents a significant challenge in Incremental Learning (IL), especially in the exemplar-free scenario where accessing old-task samples is strictly prohibited during the learning of a new task. A straightforward solution to this issue is learning and storing an independent model for each task, known as Single Task Learning (STL). Despite the linear growth in model storage with the number of tasks in STL, we empirically discover that averaging these model parameters can potentially preserve knowledge across all tasks. Inspired by this observation, we propose a Dual-Learner framework with Cumulative Parameter Averaging (DLCPA). DLCPA employs a dual-learner design: a plastic learner focused on acquiring new-task knowledge and a stable learner responsible for accumulating all learned knowledge. The knowledge from the plastic learner is transferred to the stable learner via cumulative parameter averaging. Additionally, several task-specific classifiers work in cooperation with the stable learner to yield the final prediction. Specifically, when learning a new task, these modules are updated in a cyclic manner: i) the plastic learner is initially optimized using a self-supervised loss besides the supervised loss to enhance the feature extraction robustness; ii) the stable learner is then updated with respect to the plastic learner in a cumulative parameter averaging manner to maintain its task-wise generalization; iii) the task-specific classifier is accordingly optimized to align with the stable learner. Experimental results on CIFAR-100 and Tiny-ImageNet show that DLCPA outperforms several state-of-the-art exemplar-free baselines in both Task-IL and Class-IL settings.