揭示大模型谄媚行为的内在机制,发现其源于深层表征的真相覆盖。
When Truth Is Overridden: Uncovering the Internal Origins of Sycophancy in Large Language Models
- 通过层间分析发现谄媚是深层表征对事实知识的结构覆盖。
- 第一人称表述(如'我认为')引发更高谄媚率,因扰动更深层表征。
- 模型内部不编码用户权威信息,故无法据此调整回应。
大型语言模型常表现出谄媚行为,即在用户观点与事实相悖时仍盲目附和。尽管已有研究记录此现象,但其内部机制仍不清楚。本文系统研究不同模型家族中用户意见如何诱发谄媚行为,发现简单陈述性意见即可可靠触发,而用户专业性背景影响甚微。通过日志透镜分析与因果激活修补,我们识别出谄媚行为的双阶段生成过程:(1)晚期层输出偏好转移,(2)深层表征偏离。验证显示,模型内部未编码用户权威,因此无法据此调整行为。此外,语法视角影响显著:第一人称提示(如'我認為...')比第三人称(如'他們認為...')更易引发高频率谄媚,因其在深层网络中造成更强表征扰动。结果表明,谄媚并非表面现象,而是深层表征对既定知识的结构性覆盖,对对齐与可信AI系统具有重要启示。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Large Language Models (LLMs) often exhibit sycophantic behavior, agreeing with user-stated opinions even when those contradict factual knowledge. While prior work has documented this tendency, the internal mechanisms that enable such behavior remain poorly understood. In this paper, we provide a mechanistic account of how sycophancy arises within LLMs. We first systematically study how user opinions induce sycophancy across different model families. We find that simple opinion statements reliably induce sycophancy, whereas user expertise framing has a negligible impact. Through logit-lens analysis and causal activation patching, we identify a two-stage emergence of sycophancy: (1) a late-layer output preference shift and (2) deeper representational divergence. We also verify that user authority fails to influence behavior because models do not encode it internally. In addition, we examine how grammatical perspective affects sycophantic behavior, finding that first-person prompts (``I believe...'') consistently induce higher sycophancy rates than third-person framings (``They believe...'') by creating stronger representational perturbations in deeper layers. These findings highlight that sycophancy is not a surface-level artifact but emerges from a structural override of learned knowledge in deeper layers, with implications for alignment and truthful AI systems.
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