When Inverse Data Outperforms: Exploring the Pitfalls of Mixed Data in Multi-Stage Fine-Tuning

Abstract: Existing work has shown that o1-level performance can be achieved with limited data distillation, but most existing methods focus on unidirectional supervised fine-tuning (SFT), overlooking the intricate interplay between diverse reasoning patterns. In this paper, we construct r1k, a high-quality reverse reasoning dataset derived by inverting 1,000 forward examples from s1k, and examine how SFT and Direct Preference Optimization (DPO) affect alignment under bidirectional reasoning objectives. SFT on r1k yields a 1.6%--6.8% accuracy improvement over s1k across evaluated benchmarks. However, naively mixing forward and reverse data during SFT weakens the directional distinction. Although DPO can partially recover this distinction, it also suppresses less preferred reasoning paths by shifting the probability mass toward irrelevant outputs. These findings suggest that mixed reasoning data introduce conflicting supervision signals, underscoring the need for robust and direction-aware alignment strategies.