Optimizing Soft Prompt Tuning via Structural Evolution

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Huang, Zhenzhen, Zhang, Chaoning, Bian, Haoyu, Zhang, Songbo, Tai, Chi-lok Andy, Zhang, Jiaquan, Qin, Caiyan, Qu, Jingjing, Ye, Yalan, Yang, Yang, Shen, Heng Tao
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2026
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author Huang, Zhenzhen
Zhang, Chaoning
Bian, Haoyu
Zhang, Songbo
Tai, Chi-lok Andy
Zhang, Jiaquan
Qin, Caiyan
Qu, Jingjing
Ye, Yalan
Yang, Yang
Shen, Heng Tao
author_facet Huang, Zhenzhen
Zhang, Chaoning
Bian, Haoyu
Zhang, Songbo
Tai, Chi-lok Andy
Zhang, Jiaquan
Qin, Caiyan
Qu, Jingjing
Ye, Yalan
Yang, Yang
Shen, Heng Tao
contents Soft prompt tuning leverages continuous embeddings to capture task-specific information in large pre-trained language models (LLMs), achieving competitive performance in few-shot settings. However, soft prompts rely on high-dimensional, implicit representations and lack explicit semantics and traceable training behaviors, which limits their interpretability. To address this limitation, we propose a soft prompt tuning optimization method based on topological morphological evolution. Specifically, we employ persistent homology from topological data analysis (TDA) to quantify the structural representations of soft prompts in continuous parameter space and their training process evolution. Quantitative analysis shows that topologically stable and compact soft prompts achieve better downstream performance. Based on this empirical observation, we construct a loss function for optimizing soft prompt tuning, termed Topological Soft Prompt Loss (TSLoss). TSLoss guides the model to learn structurally stable adaptations by quantifying inter-parameter connectivity and redundancy. Extensive experiments show that training with TSLoss accelerates convergence and improves tuning performance, providing an interpretable method to understand and optimize soft prompt tuning from structural and topological perspectives.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_16500
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Optimizing Soft Prompt Tuning via Structural Evolution
Huang, Zhenzhen
Zhang, Chaoning
Bian, Haoyu
Zhang, Songbo
Tai, Chi-lok Andy
Zhang, Jiaquan
Qin, Caiyan
Qu, Jingjing
Ye, Yalan
Yang, Yang
Shen, Heng Tao
Computation and Language
Soft prompt tuning leverages continuous embeddings to capture task-specific information in large pre-trained language models (LLMs), achieving competitive performance in few-shot settings. However, soft prompts rely on high-dimensional, implicit representations and lack explicit semantics and traceable training behaviors, which limits their interpretability. To address this limitation, we propose a soft prompt tuning optimization method based on topological morphological evolution. Specifically, we employ persistent homology from topological data analysis (TDA) to quantify the structural representations of soft prompts in continuous parameter space and their training process evolution. Quantitative analysis shows that topologically stable and compact soft prompts achieve better downstream performance. Based on this empirical observation, we construct a loss function for optimizing soft prompt tuning, termed Topological Soft Prompt Loss (TSLoss). TSLoss guides the model to learn structurally stable adaptations by quantifying inter-parameter connectivity and redundancy. Extensive experiments show that training with TSLoss accelerates convergence and improves tuning performance, providing an interpretable method to understand and optimize soft prompt tuning from structural and topological perspectives.
title Optimizing Soft Prompt Tuning via Structural Evolution
topic Computation and Language
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.16500