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Representation Engineering for Large-Language Models: Survey and Research Challenges

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arxiv 2502.17601 v1 pith:UFSDNY7G submitted 2025-02-24 cs.AI

Representation Engineering for Large-Language Models: Survey and Research Challenges

classification cs.AI
keywords engineeringrepresentationlarge-languagemodelsresearchagendaalternativeapproach
verification ladder T0 review T1 audit T2 compute T3 formal T4 reserved
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Large-language models are capable of completing a variety of tasks, but remain unpredictable and intractable. Representation engineering seeks to resolve this problem through a new approach utilizing samples of contrasting inputs to detect and edit high-level representations of concepts such as honesty, harmfulness or power-seeking. We formalize the goals and methods of representation engineering to present a cohesive picture of work in this emerging discipline. We compare it with alternative approaches, such as mechanistic interpretability, prompt-engineering and fine-tuning. We outline risks such as performance decrease, compute time increases and steerability issues. We present a clear agenda for future research to build predictable, dynamic, safe and personalizable LLMs.

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Cited by 12 Pith papers

Reviewed papers in the Pith corpus that reference this work. Sorted by Pith novelty score.

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