Null/No Information Rate (NIR): a statistical test to assess if a classification accuracy is significant for a given problem

Abstract

In many research contexts, especially in the biomedical field, after studying and developing a classification system a natural question arises: "Is this accuracy enough high?", or better, "Can we say, with a statistically significant confidence, that our classification system is able to solve the problem"? To answer to this question, we can use the statistical test described in this paper, which is referred in some cases as NIR (No Information Rate or Null Information Rate).