The study investigates how demographic identity is represented in a language model, using representational similarity analysis against Pew survey data across 169 demographic cells. It finds that standard last‑token read‑outs underestimate the model’s fidelity, while specific attention heads (notably L11 H16) capture demographic structure more accurately, though race‑based types remain weak. Causal interventions reveal that high fidelity does not guarantee causal use, and a 128‑dimensional probe of a single head improves alignment with survey truth but fails to recover per‑question group ordering.
arXiv:2608.29266v1 Announce Type: cross
Abstract: Researchers increasingly treat LLM survey responses as a proxy for human cultural values. This includes projecting model outputs onto instruments lik...
By An Duy Nguyen, Muhammad Aurangzeb Ahmad
arXiv:2501. 02211v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) reproduce homogeneity bias -- the tendency to portray marginalized groups as more internally similar than dominant groups -- but whether this bias generalizes across models, is stable under different inference settings, or depends on how group identity is signaled remains unstudied.
By Messi H. J. Lee
arXiv:2606. 09843v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) give stable answers to personality questionnaires, yet these self-reports fail to predict how the models behave.
By Juan Manuel Contreras
arXiv:2608. 14606v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly used as synthetic survey respondents, but existing evaluations ask whether answers look plausible at the individual level.
By Mantas Lukauskas, Viktorija \v{S}arkauskait\.e
arXiv:2606. 09843v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) produce stable self-reports on personality inventories, but these self-reports do not predict observed behavior.
By Juan Manuel Contreras
arXiv:2607. 02368v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Evaluations of LLM personas via psychometric questionnaires typically rely on aggregate scores, discarding within-instance correlation structure.
By Yuan Yuan
arXiv:2501. 02211v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) reproduce homogeneity bias -- the tendency to portray marginalized groups as more internally similar than dominant groups -- but whether this bias is stable or an artifact of inference settings has only been studied in single proprietary models.
By Messi H. J. Lee
The paper examines how large language models (LLMs) respond to different demographic cues—such as names—when users seek advice, focusing on race and gender in a U.S. context. It finds that using different cues for the same group leads to only partially overlapping changes in model responses, producing inconsistent conclusions about personalization and unstable bias metrics. The authors argue that LLMs react to linguistic signals tied to cues rather than to stable demographic categories, and they call for evaluations that use multiple cues and consider underlying mechanisms.
By Manuel Tonneau, Neil K. R. Sehgal, Niyati Malhotra, Sharif Kazemi, Victor Orozco-Olvera, Ana Mar\'ia Mu\~noz Boudet, Lakshmi Subramanian, Samuel P. Fraiberger, Sharath Chandra Guntuku, Valentin Hofmann
arXiv:2606. 20205v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Psychological instruments designed for humans are increasingly used to assign large language models (LLMs) stable psychological profiles that affect their usability, safety assessment, and use as proxies for human participants in research.
By Jelena Meyer, David Garcia, Dirk U. Wulff
arXiv:2608.22411v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Social interaction increasingly takes place in multicultural settings, where individuals may draw on multiple cultural influences and adapt their commu...
By Chongyuan Dai, Yaling Shen, Shengeng Tang, Hui Ma, Jinpeng Hu
arXiv:2607. 26348v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly used as synthetic users, stand-ins for human respondents whose simulated answers feed product, policy, and market decisions.
By Zihan Chen, Di Zhu, Lei Nico Zheng