arXiv:2607.07646cs.AIcs.CL2026-07中稿 · ICML

强化学习让模型从基础技能中组合出新策略,解决复杂重写问题。

RL Post-Training Builds Compositional Reasoning Strategies

论文配图:RL Post-Training Builds Compositional Reasoning Strategies
图 1 · 摘自论文原文
  • 用强化学习对预训练模型进行后训练,构建组合策略。
  • 在未见过的问题上,RL比预训练模型提升显著,且可复用有效结构。
  • 适合研究推理机制、模型可组合性与强化学习应用的读者。

我们研究强化学习后训练是否仅放大基础技能,还是能将其组合成更高阶策略。实验在完全可观测的重写语法环境中进行,预训练分布已知,所有生成的重写均可审计。一个Transformer模型先在原始符号重写链上预训练,再在基于轨迹的推理任务上后训练,仅使用二元最终答案奖励。强化学习在未见问题上表现优异,即使在更大采样预算下,预训练模型仍难以解决;而拒绝微调虽初期提升快,但后期停滞。轨迹分析显示,强化学习通过分阶段组合机制重组基础能力:先强化基础缩减,再发现有效组合程序,包括序列组合(压缩有序的原始缩减链)和并行组合(一步合并独立缩减)。这些组合程序并非孤立样本,而是被反复使用并固化为稳定技能库。对比强化学习与拒绝微调,关键差异不在于探索量,而在于选择性:拒绝微调产生大量捷径式重写,其中多数无效;强化学习则聚焦于有效可复用的结构。预训练消融实验表明,组合策略的出现不仅依赖基础技能暴露,更取决于预训练是否将基础能力组织为可被后续压缩的缩减过程。基础模型提供弱程序成分,强化学习将其构建成可靠高层策略。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Does RL post-training merely amplify primitive skills already latent in a base model, or can it compose primitive skills into new higher-level strategies? We study this question in a fully observable rewrite-grammar environment where the pretraining distribution is known and every generated rewrite can be audited. A Transformer is pretrained on primitive symbol-rewrite chains and post-trained on a Trace-based reasoning task with only a binary final-answer reward. RL solves held-out problems that remain rarely solved by the pretrained model even under much larger sampling budgets, while rejection fine-tuning improves early but plateaus. Trace analysis shows that RL reorganizes primitive competence through a phased compositional mechanism: it first strengthens primitive reductions, then discovers valid composed procedures. These include sequential compositions, which collapse ordered chains of primitive contractions, and parallel compositions, which combine independent primitive contractions in a single step. The composed procedures are not isolated samples; they are reused and consolidated into a stable repertoire. Comparing RL with rejection fine-tuning shows that the key difference is not exploration volume but selectivity: RFT produces many shortcut-like rewrites, much of them invalid, whereas RL concentrates exploration into valid reusable structure. Pretraining ablations show that the emergence of compositional strategies is gated not by primitive exposure alone, but by whether pretraining organizes primitive competence into reduction procedures that RL can later compress. The base model provides weak procedural ingredients; RL builds them into reliable higher-level strategies.

强化学习组合推理策略生成

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