Essay

How Regularization Changes Variance and Bias

Question: Suppose a team adds L2 regularization, L1 regularization, or dropout to a predictive model. Explain how this choice usually affects variance and bias.

Sample answer: Adding regularization typically makes the model less sensitive to fluctuations in the training data, so variance goes down. At the same time, the extra constraint makes the model less flexible, so bias goes up.

Key points:

  • Regularization usually decreases variance.
  • Regularization usually increases bias.
  • Examples of regularization include L2, L1, and dropout.

Rubric: The response must state that adding regularization lowers variance and raises bias.

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Updated 2026-08-12

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