arXiv AI

The average-farmer illusion in language-model simulations of agricultural decisions

arXiv Computation and Language
Sep 25

Artificial Societies Benchmark: A Validation Framework for Synthetic Research

The article introduces the Artificial Societies Benchmark, a validation framework designed to evaluate synthetic populations used in research. It comprises eleven tests covering internal, construct, and external validity, drawing on twenty human data sources and comparing nine language models. The benchmark links specific research uses to the evidence required and assesses how results vary with different respondent information, revealing that strong performance in one domain does not guarantee fidelity in others.

By Edoardo Chidichimo, Min Jun Jung, Felix P. S. Wallis, James K. He
arXiv Computation and Language
Aug 31

Benchmarking large language model agent societies against human behavioural distributions

The paper introduces SILICA, an open instrument designed to evaluate whether large language model (LLM) agent societies replicate human behavioural distributions. Using five environments with human‑anchored data and perturbations, the study finds that most LLMs only match human behaviour at initial stages, failing to reproduce end‑state cooperation or correct acceptance thresholds. The results suggest that current LLM societies can support exploratory claims but do not yet reliably emulate human social dynamics.

By Raad Bin Tareaf
Hugging Face Trending Papers
Aug 19

Readable, Faithful, Used: Three Dissociable Properties of Demographic Identity in a Language Model

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 AI
Aug 5

Emulate or Estimate? The Divergent Strengths of Base and Post-Trained Language Models for Opinion Simulation

arXiv:2608. 03044v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language models are increasingly used to simulate human opinions, but prior work reports conflicting results: some studies find promising alignment with human survey data, while others find persona collapse and weak demographic sensitivity.

By Seth Grief-Albert, Jessica Bo, Difan Jiao, Ashton Anderson