Estimating the Effects of Sample Training Orders for Large Language Models without Retraining

Fuente: arXiv
Guardado en:
Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Yang, Hao, Li, Haoxuan, Yang, Mengyue, Chen, Xu, Gong, Mingming
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2025
Materias:
Acceso en línea:
Etiquetas: Agregar Etiqueta
Sin Etiquetas, Sea el primero en etiquetar este registro!
_version_ 1866915309660667904
author Yang, Hao
Li, Haoxuan
Yang, Mengyue
Chen, Xu
Gong, Mingming
author_facet Yang, Hao
Li, Haoxuan
Yang, Mengyue
Chen, Xu
Gong, Mingming
contents The order of training samples plays a crucial role in large language models (LLMs), significantly impacting both their external performance and internal learning dynamics. Traditional methods for investigating this effect generally require retraining the model with various sample orders, which is computationally infeasible for LLMs. In this work, we improve traditional methods by designing a retraining-free framework. By approximating Adam optimizer updates with first- and second-order Taylor expansions and utilizing random projection methods to store intermediate checkpoints, our framework can efficiently estimate model parameters for arbitrary training sample orders. Next, we apply our framework to two downstream research problems: (1) Training curriculum design for LLMs -- we base our retraining-free framework to propose a novel curriculum learning strategy that augments curriculum proposals with estimated model performances, enabling more informed sample scheduling. (2) LLMs' memorization and generalization effect analysis -- we use our retraining-free framework to estimate how the positions of training samples influence LLMs' capacity for memorization and generalization. We conduct extensive experiments to validate the effectiveness of our retraining-free framework in reproducing the true model performances, and further demonstrate its potential in optimizing LLM training curricula and analyzing the memorization and generalization effects of LLMs.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2505_22042
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Estimating the Effects of Sample Training Orders for Large Language Models without Retraining
Yang, Hao
Li, Haoxuan
Yang, Mengyue
Chen, Xu
Gong, Mingming
Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
The order of training samples plays a crucial role in large language models (LLMs), significantly impacting both their external performance and internal learning dynamics. Traditional methods for investigating this effect generally require retraining the model with various sample orders, which is computationally infeasible for LLMs. In this work, we improve traditional methods by designing a retraining-free framework. By approximating Adam optimizer updates with first- and second-order Taylor expansions and utilizing random projection methods to store intermediate checkpoints, our framework can efficiently estimate model parameters for arbitrary training sample orders. Next, we apply our framework to two downstream research problems: (1) Training curriculum design for LLMs -- we base our retraining-free framework to propose a novel curriculum learning strategy that augments curriculum proposals with estimated model performances, enabling more informed sample scheduling. (2) LLMs' memorization and generalization effect analysis -- we use our retraining-free framework to estimate how the positions of training samples influence LLMs' capacity for memorization and generalization. We conduct extensive experiments to validate the effectiveness of our retraining-free framework in reproducing the true model performances, and further demonstrate its potential in optimizing LLM training curricula and analyzing the memorization and generalization effects of LLMs.
title Estimating the Effects of Sample Training Orders for Large Language Models without Retraining
topic Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.22042