发现语言模型错乱的根源:首词广播头主导语言识别
First-Token Broadcasters: Mechanistic Origins of Language Identity and Distributed Robustness in Transformers

- 通过逐头消融,定位到首词广播头是语言信号传播的关键
- 指令微调使语言控制集中于第0层,基础模型则分布分散
- 首词广播具有语言特异性,非拉丁语种也由第0层处理
为何多语言模型常生成错误语言?我们提出语言身份头消融(LIHA),对GPT-2中每个注意力头逐一置零,并在包含2700个跨语言提示对的数据集上测量语言切换率。结果发现少数首词广播头(如L6H1,切换率0.32,超出均值3.23σ)持续关注首个提示词,将语言信号传播至整个生成过程。消融后补偿机制显著(p < 10⁻⁵),且呈层级前向递推模式,表明是局部级联而非全局扩散。对比同架构但训练方式不同的Qwen2.5-1.5B-Base与Instruct模型,前者几乎无显著头(最高切换率0.016),后者则集中在第0层,以L0H5为主(切换率0.224,超出均值8.93σ)。该对照实证了指令微调促使语言身份电路向早期层集中。中文与俄文扩展实验确认,在GPT-2中首词广播具语言特异性,非拉丁语种同样由第0层处理。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Why do multilingual language models sometimes generate in the wrong language, and why is this so hard to fix? We introduce Language Identity Head Ablation (LIHA), a causal intervention that zeros each attention head individually and measures the resulting language switch rate across a parallel dataset of 2,700 prompt-language pairs spanning seven languages. Applied to GPT-2, LIHA identifies a small set of first-token broadcaster heads - led by L6H1 (switch rate 0.32, 3.23 $σ$ above the population mean) - that attend persistently to the first prompt token, propagating its language signal throughout generation. Compensatory redistribution when heads are ablated is statistically significant (p < $10^{-5}$) and follows a directional, hierarchical pattern: compensation always recruits heads in layers above the ablated head, suggesting a feedforward cascade rather than global diffusion. To probe how training regime shapes these circuits, we apply LIHA to a controlled pair - Qwen2.5-1.5B-Base and Qwen2.5-1.5B-Instruct - identical in architecture and size, differing only in training. The base model is nearly flat (max SR=0.016, 200/336 heads at SR=0.0); the instruct model concentrates causal influence sharply at layer 0, led by L0H5 (SR=0.224, 8.93 $σ$ above mean), with all other layers near zero. This controlled comparison provides direct causal evidence that instruction tuning reorganizes language identity circuits toward early-layer localization. Extended experiments with Chinese and Russian confirm that first-token broadcasting is script-specific in GPT-2, with non-Latin languages handled at layer 0 - the same locus as the instruction-tuned model. Code and data will be released upon publication.
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