mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

Interpret Policies in Deep Reinforcement Learning using SILVER with RL-Guided Labeling: A Model-level Approach to High-dimensional and Multi-action Environments

arXiv 2510.19244 ↗First posted 22 Oct 2025cs.LGcited by 1

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Abstract (arXiv)

Deep reinforcement learning (RL) achieves remarkable performance but lacks interpretability, limiting trust in policy behavior. The existing SILVER framework (Li, Siddique, and Cao 2025) explains RL policy via Shapley-based regression but remains restricted to low-dimensional, binary-action domains. We propose SILVER with RL-guided labeling, an enhanced variant that extends SILVER to multi-action and high-dimensional environments by incorporating the RL policy's own action outputs into the boundary points identification. Our method first extracts compact feature representations from image observations, performs SHAP-based feature attribution, and then employs RL-guided labeling to generate behaviorally consistent boundary datasets. Surrogate models, such as decision trees and regression-based functions, are subsequently trained to interpret RL policy's decision structure. We evaluate the proposed framework on two Atari environments using three deep RL algorithms and conduct human-subject study to assess the clarity and trustworthiness of the derived interpretable policy. Results show that our approach maintains competitive task performance while substantially improving transparency and human understanding of agent behavior. This work advances explainable RL by transforming SILVER into a scalable and behavior-aware framework for interpreting deep RL agents in high-dimensional, multi-action settings.

Key facts. Cited by 1 paper in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Builds on 17 of its 28 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 22 Oct 2025.

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17 of 28 references.

References · 17

  1. 2017A Unified Approach to Interpreting Model Predictionscited by 6,488
  2. 2017Understanding Black-box Predictions via Influence Functionscited by 1,714
  3. 2019Data Shapley: Equitable Valuation of Data for Machine Learningcited by 617
  4. 2024Deep Reinforcement Learning for Robotics: A Survey of Real-World Successescited by 153
  5. 2017Visualizing and Understanding Atari Agentscited by 141
  6. 2020Shapley explainability on the data manifoldcited by 88
  7. 2021A Survey on Interpretable Reinforcement Learningcited by 70
  8. 2017Interpretable Policies for Reinforcement Learning by Genetic Programmingcited by 47
  9. 2024Vision-Language Models Provide Promptable Representations for Reinforcement Learningcited by 41
  10. 2023Explaining Reinforcement Learning with Shapley Valuescited by 26
  11. 2024Helpful or Harmful Data? Fine-tuning-free Shapley Attribution for Explaining Language Model Predictionscited by 13
  12. 2024Distill2Explain: Differentiable decision trees for explainable reinforcement learning in energy application controllerscited by 5
5 more
  1. 2025Evaluating Interpretable Reinforcement Learning by Distilling Policies into Programscited by 3
  2. 2025From Explainability to Interpretability: Interpretable Policies in Reinforcement Learning Via Model Explanationcited by 2
  3. 2025A Theoretical Framework for Explaining Reinforcement Learning with Shapley Valuescited by 2
  4. 2025Surrogate Fitness Metrics for Interpretable Reinforcement Learningcited by 1
  5. 2025Counterfactual Explanations for Continuous Action Reinforcement Learningcited by 1

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