Your Model is Overconfident, and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves

Timothee Mickus, Aman Sinha, Raúl Vázquez


Abstract
The difficulty intrinsic to a given example, rooted in its inherent ambiguity, is a key yet often overlooked factor in evaluating neural NLP models. We investigate the interplay and divergence among various metrics for assessing intrinsic difficulty, including annotator dissensus, training dynamics, and model confidence. Through a comprehensive analysis using 29 models on three datasets, we reveal that while correlations exist among these metrics, their relationships are neither linear nor monotonic. By disentangling these dimensions of uncertainty, we aim to refine our understanding of data complexity and its implications for evaluating and improving NLP models.
Anthology ID:
2025.acl-long.269
Volume:
Proceedings of the 63rd Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers)
Month:
July
Year:
2025
Address:
Vienna, Austria
Editors:
Wanxiang Che, Joyce Nabende, Ekaterina Shutova, Mohammad Taher Pilehvar
Venue:
ACL
SIG:
Publisher:
Association for Computational Linguistics
Note:
Pages:
5401–5417
Language:
URL:
https://preview.aclanthology.org/ingestion-acl-25/2025.acl-long.269/
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Timothee Mickus, Aman Sinha, and Raúl Vázquez. 2025. Your Model is Overconfident, and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves. In Proceedings of the 63rd Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers), pages 5401–5417, Vienna, Austria. Association for Computational Linguistics.
Cite (Informal):
Your Model is Overconfident, and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves (Mickus et al., ACL 2025)
Copy Citation:
PDF:
https://preview.aclanthology.org/ingestion-acl-25/2025.acl-long.269.pdf