Linear Regression in Machine Learning: What is it?

ByFrancesco Chiaramonte

Linear regression is a supervised learning algorithm that is used to analyze the relationship between a dependent variable and one or more independent variables. It is a widely used method in machine learning and statistics for both simple and multiple linear regression.

The goal of linear regression is to find the best-fitting line that represents the relationship between the independent and dependent variables.

Supervised Learning

Supervised learning is a type of machine learning where the model is trained on labeled data.

The labeled data consists of input-output pairs, where the input is the independent variable(s) and the output is the dependent variable.

The model is trained to learn the relationship between the input and output so that it can make predictions on new, unseen data.

Linear regression is a supervised learning algorithm because it is trained on labeled data to predict the value of a dependent variable.

Simple Linear Regression

Simple linear regression is used when there is only one independent variable. The equation for simple linear regression is:

y = b0 + b1 * x

Where y is the dependent variable, x is the independent variable, b0 is the y-intercept, and b1 is the slope of the line.

The slope, b1, represents the change in y for a one-unit change in x.

The goal of simple linear regression is to find the best-fitting line that represents the relationship between the independent and dependent variables.

Multiple Linear Regression

Multiple linear regression is used when there are multiple independent variables. The equation for multiple linear regression is:

y = b0 + b1 * x1 + b2 * x2 + … + bn * xn

Where y is the dependent variable, x1, x2, …, xn are the independent variables, and b0, b1, b2, …, bn are the coefficients.

The coefficients, b1, b2, …, bn represent the change in y for a one unit change in each independent variable. The goal of multiple linear regression is to find the best-fitting line that represents the relationship between the independent and dependent variables.

Model Evaluation

Linear regression models can be evaluated using different statistical measures such as:

  • Mean Absolute Error (MAE)
  • Mean Squared Error (MSE)
  • Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE)
  • R-squared

R-squared is a measure of how well the model fits the data. It ranges from 0 to 1, with 1 indicating a perfect fit.

Conclusion

Linear regression is a supervised learning algorithm that is used to analyze the relationship between a dependent variable and one or more independent variables.

Simple linear regression is used when there is only one independent variable and multiple linear regression when there are multiple independent variables.

Linear regression models can be evaluated using different statistical measures such as MAE, MSE, RMSE, and R-squared, with R-squared being a commonly used measure to evaluate model fit.

Linear regression is a simple yet powerful tool for understanding the relationship between variables in a dataset in supervised learning.

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