# Neural network softmax activation

I'm trying to perform backpropagation on a neural network using Softmax activation on the output layer and a cross-entropy cost function. Here are the steps I take:

1. Calculate the error gradient with respect to each output neuron's input:

$$\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j} = {\frac{\partial E} {\partial o_j}}{\frac{\partial o_j} {\partial z_j}}$$

where $\frac{\partial E} {\partial o_j}$ is the derivative of the cost function with respect to the node's output and $\frac{\partial o_j} {\partial z_j}$ is the derivative of the activation function.

1. Adjust the output layer's weights using the following formula:

$$w_{ij} = w'_{ij} - r{\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j}} {o_i}$$

where $r$ is some learning rate constant and $o_i$ is the $i$th output from the previous layer.

1. Adjust the hidden layer's weights using the following formula:

$$w_{ij} = w'_{ij} - r{\frac{\partial o_j} {\partial z_j}} {\sum_k (E_k w'_{jk})} {o_i}$$

where ${\frac{\partial o_j} {\partial z_j}}$ is the derivative of the hidden layer's activation function and $E$ is the vector of output layer error gradients computed in Step 1.

Question: The internet has told me that when using Softmax combined with cross entropy, Step 1 simply becomes

$$\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j} = o_j - t_j$$ where $t$ is a one-hot encoded target output vector. Is this correct?

For some reason, each round of backpropagation is causing my network to adjust itself heavily toward the provided label - so much that the network's predictions are always whatever the most recent backpropagation label was, regardless of input. I don't understand why this is happening, or how it can even be possible.

There must be something wrong with the method I'm using. Any ideas?

The internet has told me that when using Softmax combined with cross entropy, Step 1 simply becomes $\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j} = o_j - t_j$ where $t$ is a one-hot encoded target output vector. Is this correct?

Yes. Before going through the proof, let me change the notation to avoid careless mistakes in translation:

### Notation:

whereby $j$ is the index denoting any of the $K$ output neurons - not necessarily the one corresponding to the true, ($t)$, value. Now,

\begin{align} o_j&=\sigma(j)=\sigma(z_j)=\text{softmax}(j)=\text{softmax (neuron }j)=\frac{e^{z_j}}{\displaystyle\sum_K e^{z_k}}\\[3ex] z_j &= \mathbf w_j^\top \mathbf x = \text{preactivation (neuron }j) \end{align}

The loss function is the negative log likelihood:

$$E = -\log \sigma(t) = -\log \left(\text{softmax}(t)\right)$$

The negative log likelihood is also known as the multiclass cross-entropy (ref: Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning Section 4.3.4), as they are in fact two different interpretations of the same formula.

### Gradient of the loss function with respect to the pre-activation of an output neuron:

\begin{align} \frac{\partial E}{\partial z_j}&=\frac{\partial}{\partial z_j}\,-\log\left( \sigma(t)\right)\\[2ex] &= \frac{-1}{\sigma(t)}\quad\frac{\partial}{\partial z_j}\sigma(t)\\[2ex] &= \frac{-1}{\sigma(t)}\quad\frac{\partial}{\partial z_j}\sigma(z_j)\\[2ex] &= \frac{-1}{\sigma(t)}\quad\frac{\partial}{\partial z_j}\frac{e^{z_t}}{\displaystyle\sum_k e^{z_k}}\\[2ex] &= \frac{-1}{\sigma(t)}\quad\left[ \frac{\frac{\partial }{\partial z_j }e^{z_t}}{\displaystyle \sum_K e^{z_k}} \quad - \quad \frac{e^{z_t}\quad \frac{\partial}{\partial z_j}\displaystyle \sum_K e^{z_k}}{\left[\displaystyle\sum_K e^{z_k}\right]^2}\right]\\[2ex] &= \frac{-1}{\sigma(t)}\quad\left[ \frac{\delta_{jt}\;e^{z_t}}{\displaystyle \sum_K e^{z_k}} \quad - \quad \frac{e^{z_t}}{\displaystyle\sum_K e^{z_k}} \frac{e^{z_j}}{\displaystyle\sum_K e^{z_k}}\right]\\[2ex] &= \frac{-1}{\sigma(t)}\quad\left(\delta_{jt}\sigma(t) - \sigma(t)\sigma(j) \right)\\[2ex] &= - (\delta_{jt} - \sigma(j))\\[2ex] &= \sigma(j) - \delta_{jt} \end{align}

This is practically identical to $\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j} = o_j - t_j$, and it does become identical if instead of focusing on $j$ as an individual output neuron, we transition to vectorial notation (as indicated in your question), and $t_j$ becomes the one-hot encoded vector of true values, which in my notation would be $\small \begin{bmatrix}0&0&0&\cdots&1&0&0&0_K\end{bmatrix}^\top$.

Then, with $\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j} = o_j - t_j$ we are really calculating the gradient of the loss function with respect to the preactivation of all output neurons: the vector $t_j$ will contain a $1$ only in the neuron corresponding to the correct category, which is equivalent to the delta function $\delta_{jt}$, which is $1$ only when differentiating with respect to the pre-activation of the output neuron of the correct category.

In the Geoffrey Hinton's Coursera ML course the following chunk of code illustrates the implementation in Octave:

%% Compute derivative of cross-entropy loss function.
error_deriv = output_layer_state - expanded_target_batch;


The expanded_target_batch corresponds to the one-hot encoded sparse matrix with corresponding to the target of the training set. Hence, in the majority of the output neurons, the error_deriv = output_layer_state $(\sigma(j))$, because $\delta_{jt}$ is $0$, except for the neuron corresponding to the correct classification, in which case, a $1$ is going to be subtracted from $\sigma(j).$

The actual measurement of the cost is carried out with...

% MEASURE LOSS FUNCTION.
CE = -sum(sum(...
expanded_target_batch .* log(output_layer_state + tiny))) / batchsize;


We see again the $\frac{\partial E}{\partial z_j}$ in the beginning of the backpropagation algorithm:

$$\small\frac{\partial E}{\partial W_{hidd-2-out}}=\frac{\partial \text{outer}_{input}}{\partial W_{hidd-2-out}}\, \frac{\partial E}{\partial \text{outer}_{input}}=\frac{\partial z_j}{\partial W_{hidd-2-out}}\, \frac{\partial E}{\partial z_j}$$

in

hid_to_output_weights_gradient =  hidden_layer_state * error_deriv';


since $z_j = \text{outer}_{in}= W_{hidd-2-out} \times \text{hidden}_{out}$

• The splitting of partials in the OP, $\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j} = {\frac{\partial E} {\partial o_j}}{\frac{\partial o_j} {\partial z_j}}$, seems unwarranted.

• The updating of the weights from hidden to output proceeds as...

hid_to_output_weights_delta = ...
momentum .* hid_to_output_weights_delta + ...

which don't include the output $o_j$ in the OP formula: $w_{ij} = w'_{ij} - r{\frac{\partial E} {\partial z_j}} {o_i}.$ The formula would be more along the lines of...
$$W_{hidd-2-out}:=W_{hidd-2-out}-r\, \small \frac{\partial E}{\partial W_{hidd-2-out}}\, \Delta_{hidd-2-out}$$