Chapter 4. Using Reinforcement Learning for Predictive Analytics

As a human being, we learn from past experiences. We haven't become so charming by accident. Years of positive compliments as well as negative criticism have all helped shape us into who we are today. We learn how to ride a bike by trying out different muscle movements until it just clicks. When you perform actions, you're sometimes rewarded immediately. This is all about reinforcement learning (RL).

This lesson is all about designing a machine learning system driven by criticisms and rewards. We will see how to apply reinforcement learning algorithms for the predictive model on real-life datasets.

In a nutshell, the following topics will be covered throughout this lesson:

• Reinforcement learning

• Reinforcement learning for predictive analytics

• Notation, policy, and utility in RL

• Developing a multiarmed bandit's predictive model

• Developing a stock price predictive model