通过权重算术调整模型,实现对大模型行为的精准控制。
Steering Language Models with Weight Arithmetic
- 用两次微调的权重差确定行为方向,再通过加减实现参数修改。
- 相比激活调控,该方法在分布外场景下保持更强的行为控制力。
- 适合需要避免模型过度迎合或漂移的研究者使用。
在多样化的训练分布上为大型语言模型提供高质量反馈既困难又昂贵,而仅在窄分布上反馈可能导致意外泛化。为更有效利用窄分布数据,我们提出对比权重操控(contrastive weight steering),一种简单的训练后方法,通过权重算术编辑模型参数。通过减去两个小规模微调的权重变化——一个诱导期望行为,另一个诱导相反行为——来分离出权重空间中的行为方向,再添加或移除该方向以改变模型权重。我们将该技术应用于缓解模型逢迎倾向和诱导偏差行为,发现权重操控通常比激活操控具有更强的分布外行为控制能力,且在性能下降前维持更长时间的有效性。此外,在特定任务微调中,权重操控可部分缓解不良行为漂移:在保留任务性能提升的同时减少逢迎倾向和拒绝不足问题。最后,我们初步表明,通过测量微调更新与‘恶意’权重方向的相似性,可检测到潜在的涌现偏差,暗示可在训练过程中监控权重演变,识别训练或评估中从未显现的罕见偏差行为。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Providing high-quality feedback to Large Language Models (LLMs) on a diverse training distribution can be difficult and expensive, and providing feedback only on a narrow distribution can result in unintended generalizations. To better leverage narrow training data, we propose contrastive weight steering, a simple post-training method that edits the model parameters using weight arithmetic. We isolate a behavior direction in weight-space by subtracting the weight deltas from two small fine-tunes -- one that induces the desired behavior and another that induces its opposite -- and then add or remove this direction to modify the model's weights. We apply this technique to mitigate sycophancy and induce misalignment, and find that weight steering often generalizes further than activation steering, achieving stronger out-of-distribution behavioral control before degrading general capabilities. We also show that, in the context of task-specific fine-tuning, weight steering can partially mitigate undesired behavioral drift: it can reduce sycophancy and under-refusals introduced during fine-tuning while preserving task performance gains. Finally, we provide preliminary evidence that emergent misalignment can be detected by measuring the similarity between fine-tuning updates and an "evil" weight direction, suggesting that it may be possible to monitor the evolution of weights during training and detect rare misaligned behaviors that never manifest during training or evaluations.
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