arXiv:2602.02863cs.AIcs.LG2026-02被引 1

用推理过程中的异常信号,提前发现大模型的思维断裂。

"I May Not Have Articulated Myself Clearly": Diagnosing Dynamic Instability in LLM Reasoning at Inference Time

  • 通过分析生成时的分布偏移和不确定性,检测推理中断
  • 早期不稳定可能纠错,晚期则几乎必然出错
  • 无需训练,通用可复现,适合调试大模型推理

大语言模型在推理过程中常出现'丢失思路'的问题,但传统评估只关注最终结果。本文基于标准API可获取的词元概率信息,提出一种无需训练、不依赖特定模型的动态不稳定性诊断方法。该方法结合连续步骤间的分布偏移(JSD)与熵值,以峰值不稳定性强度作为诊断指标。在GSM8K和HotpotQA数据集上,该信号能显著预测错误答案,且在不同模型规模下呈现单调准确率下降趋势。关键发现:早期不稳定性可能伴随后续修复并得出正确答案(修正型),而晚期不稳定性则更易导致失败(破坏型),即使峰值强度相同。说明模型恢复能力不仅取决于扰动强度,还取决于发生时间与剩余推理阶段的关系。方法完全模型无关、训练自由,仅用于诊断而非纠正。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Reasoning failures in large language models (LLMs) are typically measured only at the end of a generation, yet many failures manifest as a process-level breakdown: the model "loses the thread" mid-reasoning. We study whether such breakdowns are detectable from inference-time observables available in standard APIs (token log probabilities), without any training or fine-tuning. We define a simple instability signal that combines consecutive-step distributional shift (JSD) and uncertainty (entropy), summarize each trace by its peak instability strength, and show that this signal reliably predicts failure. Across GSM8K and HotpotQA, instability strength predicts wrong answers with above-chance AUC and yields monotonic bucket-level accuracy decline at scale across model sizes. Crucially, we show that instability is not uniformly harmful: early instability can reflect subsequent stabilization and a correct final answer (\emph{corrective instability}), whereas late instability is more often followed by failure (\emph{destructive instability}), even at comparable peak magnitudes, indicating that recoverability depends not only on how strongly the distribution changes but also on when such changes occur relative to the remaining decoding horizon. The method is model-agnostic, training-free, and reproducible, and is presented as a diagnostic lens rather than a corrective or control mechanism.

大模型推理动态诊断稳定性分析

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