arXiv AI

CuMA: Aligning LLMs with Sparse Cultural Values via Demographic-Aware Mixture of Adapters

arXiv:2601. 04885v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: As Large Language Models (LLMs) serve a global audience, alignment must transition from enforcing universal consensus to respecting cultural pluralism.

arXiv AI
Aug 21

DiverValue-Bench: A Benchmark and Fine-Tuning Framework for Aligning Large Language Models with Diverse Human Values

arXiv:2509. 08022v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Aligning large language models (LLMs) with diverse human values is essential for safe and effective deployment, yet existing benchmarks often overlook cultural and demographic variation.

By Yao Liang, Dongcheng Zhao, Feifei Zhao, Guobin Shen, Yuwei Wang, Dongqi Liang, Yi Zeng
arXiv AI
4d ago

Population Fidelity: Evaluating Population Representativeness in LLMs

The paper introduces Population Fidelity, an evaluation framework for assessing how well large language models (LLMs) represent human population attitudes. It focuses on three dimensions: group-level accuracy, between-group variation, and the structure of that variation. Using the framework, the authors replicate a prior study on machine bias and test cultural fine-tuning, finding that while fine-tuning improves overall alignment, it does not enhance representation of within-population differences.

By Neemias B. da Silva, Martin Lukk, Ali Sutani, Abhishek Moturu, Harris Yang, Daniel Silver, Matt Ratto, Thiago H. Silva
arXiv Computation and Language
Sep 21

Cultural Alignment in Large Language Models Using Soft Prompt Tuning

The paper proposes a method for culturally aligning large language models (LLMs) using soft prompt tuning optimized via Differential Evolution (DE). Unlike traditional fine‑tuning or reinforcement learning, this approach keeps model weights frozen and requires no preference data, instead leveraging aggregated survey scores from Hofstede's Value Survey Module (VSM13). Experiments on four countries and four instruction‑tuned models show that DE‑optimized prompts reduce cultural discrepancy, improve agreement with the World Values Survey, and are preferred in blinded pairwise evaluations by LLM judges.

By Reem I. Masoud, Martin Ferianc, Philip Treleaven, Miguel Rodrigues
arXiv Computation and Language
Sep 1

CoCoA: Context-Conditional Cultural Alignment for Large Language Models

CoCoA (Context-Conditional Cultural Alignment) is a framework designed to mitigate cultural bias in large language models by learning context-conditional behavior. It trains on entity pairs under both culturally cued and neutral contexts, using a contrastive alignment objective combined with calibration, drift regularization, and goal-aware gradient reconciliation. Evaluations on CAMeL and Camellia across ten languages and four LLMs show that CoCoA reduces the Cultural Bias Score from 43 to 24 on average while keeping near-neutral preferences at 50.2, with minimal impact on general performance.

By Kyungdon Lee, Wei Xu, Alan Ritter, Dong-Ho Lee, JinYeong Bak
arXiv AI
Sep 2

WorldBench: Culturally Grounded Benchmark for Multilingual Agents

WorldBench is a new multilingual benchmark that tests large language model agents on culturally grounded everyday workflows, offering 1,600 tasks in seven languages and eight cultures. The benchmark evaluates agents through structured sandbox actions and introduces Constrained Task Success (CTS), a metric that assesses task completion, minimal modification, and other complementary aspects via deterministic and LLM-as-a-Judge evaluations. Experiments show that even leading models achieve only 49.2% CTS, revealing significant gaps in correctness and state preservation across languages and cultures.

By Leonardo Ranaldi, Sherrie Shen, Jushi Kai, Alexandra Birch
arXiv AI
Sep 4

One Model to Translate Them All? A Journey to Mount Doom for Multilingual Model Merging

The paper investigates weight‑space merging of independently fine‑tuned multilingual machine translation models. Experiments show that merging is more successful when models share a target language, yet it still cannot match the peak performance of language‑specific checkpoints. When target languages differ, performance drops sharply, and analysis reveals that overlapping neuron activation and incompatible upper‑layer geometries cause these failures.

By Baban Gain, Trilok Nath Singh, Asif Ekbal