arXiv:2509.16660cs.CL2025-09NeurIPS被引 3

通过分解模型输出层,精准抑制毒性生成而不影响语言能力。

Redefining Experts: Interpretable Decomposition of Language Models for Toxicity Mitigation

  • 用输出层特征分解替代单神经元干预,提升稳定性。
  • 在Jigsaw和ToxiCN数据集上实现显著毒性降低,且语言质量不变。
  • 无需微调,理论严谨,适合安全可控的AI应用。

大型语言模型虽在多任务中表现出色,但生成有毒内容的问题严重威胁AI安全与公众信任。现有方法多依赖调整单个神经元激活,存在不稳、依赖上下文且损害语言能力等问题。我们通过在Jigsaw和ToxiCN数据集上的实验,验证了层间聚合特征比单神经元信号更鲁棒;发现以往方法混淆了毒性检测与生成专家,导致机制偏差。为此提出新方法EigenShift,基于模型输出层的特征分解,仅针对生成相关成分进行干预,实现精准毒性抑制。该方法无需额外训练或微调,计算开销极低,具备严格的理论支撑。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Large Language Models have demonstrated impressive fluency across diverse tasks, yet their tendency to produce toxic content remains a critical challenge for AI safety and public trust. Existing toxicity mitigation approaches primarily manipulate individual neuron activations, but these methods suffer from instability, context dependence, and often compromise the model's core language abilities. To address these shortcomings, we investigate three key questions: the stability of neuron-level toxicity indicators, the advantages of structural (layer-wise) representations, and the interpretability of mechanisms driving toxic generation. Through extensive experiments on Jigsaw and ToxiCN datasets, we show that aggregated layer-wise features provide more robust signals than single neurons. Moreover, we observe conceptual limitations in prior works that conflate toxicity detection experts and generation experts within neuron-based interventions. To mitigate this, we propose a novel principled intervention technique, EigenShift, based on eigen-decomposition of the language model's final output layer. This method selectively targets generation-aligned components, enabling precise toxicity suppression without impairing linguistic competence. Our method requires no additional training or fine-tuning, incurs minimal computational cost, and is grounded in rigorous theoretical analysis.

毒性抑制可解释性模型干预

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