揭示模型合并的通用理论,解释为何过训练专家会失效。
A Unified Generalization Framework for Model Merging: Trade-offs, Non-Linearity, and Scaling Laws
- 用L2稳定性理论分解合并误差,分离优化与泛化影响。
- 发现优化与泛化权衡规律,解释过训练导致合并崩溃现象。
- 提出可量化的超参数缩放定律,指导高效模型合并设计。
模型合并能将多个微调模型的能力整合到单一模型中,仅在参数空间操作,无需原始数据或昂贵重计算。尽管已有实证成功,但对异构微调超参数(如不同学习率、批量大小)下其有效性的统一理论仍缺失。现有联邦学习理论仅关注优化,无法解释模型合并,且引发理论悖论。本文首次将$L_2$-稳定性理论引入异构环境,严格解耦合并模型$oldsymbol{x}_{avg}$的过风险为优化误差与泛化误差。核心贡献包括:(i) 数学证明基本的“优化-泛化权衡”,明确解释为何过训练专家会导致合并崩溃;(ii) 建立统一理论框架,解释线性(如TA、AdaMerging)与先进非线性(如TIES、DARE)合并算法,证明稀疏化算子通过抑制任务异质性严格收紧泛化界;(iii) 推导出定量缩放定律,精准预测超参数选择的影响,帮助从业者构建“可合并”的专家模型。在ResNet与ViT架构上,20个视觉分类任务,数千个微调模型的实验验证了理论缩放定律对$oldsymbol{x}_{avg}$泛化行为的准确预测能力。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Model merging efficiently aggregates capabilities from multiple fine-tuned models into a single one, operating purely in parameter space without original data or expensive re-computation. Despite empirical successes, a unified theory for its effectiveness under heterogeneous finetuning hyperparameters (e.g., varying learning rates, batch sizes) remains missing. Existing federated learning theories focus purely on optimization, which fails to explain model merging and inherently leads to theoretical paradoxes. To address this challenge, we pioneer the integration of $L_2$-Stability theory into heterogeneous environments to rigorously decouple the excess risk of the merged model $\boldsymbol{x}_{avg}$ into optimization and generalization errors. This comprehensive analysis yields three main contributions: (i) We mathematically establish the fundamental \textit{Optimization-Generalization Trade-off}, explicitly resolving the paradox of why over-trained experts lead to catastrophic merging collapse. (ii) \textit{A unified theoretical framework} is provided to explain not only linear merging algorithms (e.g., TA, AdaMerging) but also state-of-the-art \textit{non-linear} merging algorithms (e.g., TIES, DARE), proving how sparsification operators strictly tighten the generalization bound by suppressing task heterogeneity. (iii) Rather than heuristic guidelines, we derive \textit{Quantitative Scaling Laws} that theoretically predict the precise impact of hyperparameter choices, enabling practitioners to strategically construct ``merge-friendly'' experts. Extensive experiments on the ResNet and ViT architectures across 20 visual classification tasks, involving thousands of finetuning models, robustly confirm that our theoretical scaling laws accurately predict the empirical generalization behaviors of $\boldsymbol{x}_{avg}$.
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