Metadata Predictability Is Not Evidence Dependence: An Intervention-Based Audit for Weak-Label Benchmarks

Kan Shao

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arXiv · 2605.23701

Metadata Predictability Is Not Evidence Dependence: An Intervention-Based Audit for Weak-Label Benchmarks

Kan Shao

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Abstract

We study a protocol-level test for weak-label benchmarks: whether benchmark outputs change when the provided evidence is intervened on. Metadata-only shortcut checks answer a different question, namely whether outputs are predictable from metadata priors. We therefore combine a metadata statistic, the Metadata Prior Dominance Score (MPDS), with an evidence-intervention statistic, {\Delta}Evi, measuring sensitivity to evidence identity under cross-item shuffling. Synthetic HotpotQA gives a constructed counterexample to metadata-only screening: MPDS is only moderate (0.643), yet {\Delta}Evi is zero. Stronger-reader reruns show why calibration belongs in the test procedure: SNLI shows a calibration reversal, reconstructed HotpotQA occupies a question-dominant warning region, and FEVER is a strongly evidence-sensitive positive control across four transformers. The practical lesson is simple: benchmark audits should report metadata-only screening, evidence intervention, and reader-strength calibration together.

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Kan Shao. 2026-05-22. Metadata Predictability Is Not Evidence Dependence: An Intervention-Based Audit for Weak-Label Benchmarks. https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.23701

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