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Variation-resistant Q-learning: Controlling and Utilizing Estimation Bias in Reinforcement Learning for Better Performance

Q-learning is a reinforcement learning algorithm that has overestimation bias, because it learns the optimal action values by using a target that maximizes over uncertain action-value estimates. Although the overestimation bias of Q-learning is generally considered harmful, a recent study suggests that it could be either harmful or helpful depending on the reinforcement learning problem. In this paper, we propose a new Q-learning variant, called Variation-resistant Q-learning, to control and utilize estimation bias for better performance. Firstly, we present the tabular version of the algorithm and mathematically prove its convergence. Secondly, we combine the algorithm with function approximation. Finally, we present empirical results from three different experiments, in which we compared the performance of Variation-resistant Q-learning, Q-learning, and Double Q-learning. The empirical results show that Variation-resistant Q-learning can control and utilize estimation bias for better performance in the experimental tasks.