Metonymic Circuits for Abstract Concept Grounding in Vision Transformers

arXiv:2610.06928v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: We study how Vision Transformers ground abstract concepts (e.g., angry) when training data provide limited direct referential evidence. We hypothesize a metonymic grounding mechanism in which abstract predictions are driven by concrete, interpretable anchor concepts (e.g., fire) that bridge visual signals to abstract semantics. By applying…