No Usable Linear "Capitulation Direction" in Two Small LLMs: A Validation Protocol for Activation-Steering Claims, and a Cross-Family Behavioral Study of Sycophancy Under Pushback
Language models frequently abandon correct answers when users push back. We study this in two small instruction-tuned models from different families, Qwen2.5-1.5B and Llama-3.2-1B, over TriviaQA: the model answers, is challenged with one of four scripted pushback styles, and answers again. Conditioned on an initially correct answer, the models flip to a wrong answer in 41.8% and 43.1% of episodes. Which pressure works is a property of the model, not the pressure: the same within-question paired comparison (bare doubt vs. emotional appeal), specified in advance, is Bonferroni-significant in opposite directions across families (Qwen: bare doubt > emotional, OR 2.5, p=.040; Llama: emotional ...
| Authors | Saad Aamir, Muhammad Awais Bin Adil |
|---|---|
| Primary category | cs.CL |
| Published | 16 July 2026 |
| Last updated at source | 16 July 2026 |
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