Empowering Persian LLMs for Instruction Following: A Novel Dataset and Training Approach

Hojjat Mokhtarabadi, Ziba Zamani, Abbas Maazallahi, Mohammad Hossein Manshaei


Abstract
Instruction-tuned large language models have demonstrated remarkable capabilities in following human instructions across various domains. However, their proficiency remains notably deficient in many low-resource languages. To address this challenge, we begin by introducing FarsInstruct: a comprehensive instruction dataset designed to enhance the instruction-following ability of large language models specifically for the Persian language—a significant yet underrepresented language globally. FarsInstruct encompasses a wide range of task types and datasets, each containing a mix of straightforward to complex manual written instructions, as well as translations from the Public Pool of Prompts, ensuring a rich linguistic and cultural representation. Furthermore, we introduce Co-CoLA, a framework designed to enhance the multi-task adaptability of LoRA-tuned models. Through extensive experimental analyses, our study showcases the effectiveness of the FarsInstruct dataset coupled with training by the Co-CoLA framework, in improving the performance of large language models within the Persian context. As of the current writing, FarsInstruct comprises 197 templates across 21 distinct datasets, and we intend to update it consistently, thus augmenting its applicability.
Anthology ID:
2025.loreslm-1.3
Volume:
Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Models for Low-Resource Languages
Month:
January
Year:
2025
Address:
Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
Editors:
Hansi Hettiarachchi, Tharindu Ranasinghe, Paul Rayson, Ruslan Mitkov, Mohamed Gaber, Damith Premasiri, Fiona Anting Tan, Lasitha Uyangodage
Venues:
LoResLM | WS
SIG:
Publisher:
Association for Computational Linguistics
Note:
Pages:
31–67
Language:
URL:
https://aclanthology.org/2025.loreslm-1.3/
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Hojjat Mokhtarabadi, Ziba Zamani, Abbas Maazallahi, and Mohammad Hossein Manshaei. 2025. Empowering Persian LLMs for Instruction Following: A Novel Dataset and Training Approach. In Proceedings of the First Workshop on Language Models for Low-Resource Languages, pages 31–67, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Association for Computational Linguistics.
Cite (Informal):
Empowering Persian LLMs for Instruction Following: A Novel Dataset and Training Approach (Mokhtarabadi et al., LoResLM 2025)
Copy Citation:
PDF:
https://aclanthology.org/2025.loreslm-1.3.pdf