arXiv:2605.03096cs.LGcs.CL2026-05

用提示词算术消除模型对伪相关特征的依赖,提升分布外鲁棒性。

When Prompts Interact: Assessing Prompt Arithmetic for Deconfounding under Distribution Shift

论文配图:When Prompts Interact: Assessing Prompt Arithmetic for Deconfounding under Distribution Shift
图 1 · 摘自论文原文
  • 通过混合任务提示与线性化混杂提示,实现参数高效去混淆
  • 在多个基准上显著改善分布外性能与鲁棒性的权衡
  • 适合关注轻量级模型鲁棒性优化的研究者

在分类任务中,模型可能依赖混杂变量获得良好的分布内表现,但这类捷径行为在分布外场景下会严重退化。任务算术可通过减去次要模型更新来消除冗余信号,但通常需要全量微调,计算成本高。提示调优通过可训练虚拟标记实现参数高效适应。本文研究在提示词上进行任务算术是否能降低对伪相关特征的依赖。提出混合提示算术(HyPA),结合任务提示与线性化混杂提示以对抗伪相关。在多个基准测试中,相较于基线提示算术方法,HyPA在分布移位下始终改善了鲁棒性-性能权衡。进一步分析发现,其作用机制可能是减弱混杂信号对预测的影响或抑制其在表示中的存在。结果表明,HyPA是一种参数高效且有前景的应对混杂偏移的方法。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

In classification tasks, models may rely on confounding variables to achieve strong in-distribution performance, capturing spurious features that fail under distribution shift. This shortcut behavior leads to substantial degradation in out-of-distribution settings. Task arithmetic offers a potential solution by removing unwanted signals via subtraction of secondary model updates, but it typically requires full fine-tuning, which is computationally expensive. Prompt tuning provides a parameter-efficient alternative by adapting models through a small set of trainable virtual tokens. Task arithmetic on the resulting prompts presents an appealing alternative to operations on entire models, but the extent to which this approach can limit reliance on spurious features remains to be established. In this work, we study whether composing soft prompts through task arithmetic improves robustness to confounding shifts. We propose Hybrid Prompt Arithmetic (HyPA), which combines task prompts with linearized confounder prompts to counteract spurious correlations. Across multiple benchmarks, HyPA consistently improves the robustness-performance trade-off relative to prompt-arithmetic baselines under distribution shift. We further analyze how HyPA affects hidden representations and find evidence consistent with it mitigating confounding either by reducing the influence of confounder signals on predictions or by suppressing them in the representation. These results establish HyPA as a parameter-efficient and promising approach for improving robustness under confounding shifts in the evaluated setting.

提示调优鲁棒性去混淆

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