This was part of Reinforcement Learning from Offline Data and Human Feedback

Deep Transfer Offline Q-Learning under Nonstationary Environments

Jianqing Fan, Princeton University

Monday, April 20, 2026



Slides
Abstract:

In dynamic decision-making scenarios across business and healthcare, leveraging sample trajectories from diverse populations can significantly enhance reinforcement learning (RL) performance for specific target populations. While existing transfer learning methods primarily focus on linear regression settings, they lack direct applicability to reinforcement learning algorithms. This paper pioneers the study of transfer learning for dynamic decision scenarios modeled by nonstationary finite-horizon Markov decision processes, utilizing neural networks as powerful function approximators and backward inductive learning. We demonstrate that naive sample pooling strategies, effective in regression settings, fail in Markov decision processes. To address this challenge, we introduce a novel “re-weighted targeting procedure” to construct “transferable RL samples” and propose “transfer deep Q-learning”, enabling neural network approximation with theoretical guarantees. We assume that the reward functions are transferable and deal with both situations in which the transition densities are transferable or nontransferable. Our analytical techniques for transfer learning in neural network approximation and transition density transfers have broader implications, extending to supervised transfer learning with neural networks and domain shift scenarios. Empirical experiments on both synthetic and real datasets corroborate the advantages of our method. (Joint work with Jinhang Chai and Elynn Chen)