mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

Tree of Clarifications: Answering Ambiguous Questions with Retrieval-Augmented Large Language Models

arXiv 2310.14696 ↗First posted 23 Oct 2023cs.CLcited by 42

On the map: Retrieval-augmented generation → RAG robustness and adaptive retrieval

Abstract (arXiv)

Questions in open-domain question answering are often ambiguous, allowing multiple interpretations. One approach to handling them is to identify all possible interpretations of the ambiguous question (AQ) and to generate a long-form answer addressing them all, as suggested by Stelmakh et al., (2022). While it provides a comprehensive response without bothering the user for clarification, considering multiple dimensions of ambiguity and gathering corresponding knowledge remains a challenge. To cope with the challenge, we propose a novel framework, Tree of Clarifications (ToC): It recursively constructs a tree of disambiguations for the AQ -- via few-shot prompting leveraging external knowledge -- and uses it to generate a long-form answer. ToC outperforms existing baselines on ASQA in a few-shot setup across the metrics, while surpassing fully-supervised baselines trained on the whole training set in terms of Disambig-F1 and Disambig-ROUGE. Code is available at https://github.com/gankim/tree-of-clarifications.

Key facts. Cited by 42 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in RAG robustness and adaptive retrieval, one of 15 directions in Retrieval-augmented generation. Builds on 25 of its 31 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 23 Oct 2023.

Builds on

25 of 31 references.

References · 25

  1. 2022Training language models to follow instructions with human feedbackcited by 15,712
  2. 2019Exploring the Limits of Transfer Learning with a Unified Text-to-Text Transformercited by 14,491
  3. 2019RoBERTa: A Robustly Optimized BERT Pretraining Approachcited by 13,266
  4. 2020Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Knowledge-Intensive NLP Taskscited by 9,160
  5. 2019Sentence-BERT: Sentence Embeddings using Siamese BERT-Networkscited by 9,049
  6. 2022PaLM: Scaling Language Modeling with Pathwayscited by 5,304
  7. 2020Dense Passage Retrieval for Open-Domain Question Answeringcited by 3,779
  8. 2017Billion-scale similarity search with GPUscited by 2,477
  9. 2022Language Models (Mostly) Know What They Knowcited by 1,783
  10. 2016MS MARCO: A Human Generated MAchine Reading COmprehension Datasetcited by 1,591
  11. 2018Know What You Don't Know: Unanswerable Questions for SQuADcited by 1,538
  12. 2020MiniLM: Deep Self-Attention Distillation for Task-Agnostic Compression of Pre-Trained Transformerscited by 1,414
13 more
  1. 2020Leveraging Passage Retrieval with Generative Models for Open Domain Question Answeringcited by 1,203
  2. 2020ColBERT: Efficient and Effective Passage Search via Contextualized Late Interaction over BERTcited by 1,160
  3. 2017Reading Wikipedia to Answer Open-Domain Questionscited by 777
  4. 2020AmbigQA: Answering Ambiguous Open-domain Questionscited by 385
  5. 2022Demonstrate-Search-Predict: Composing retrieval and language models for knowledge-intensive NLPcited by 316
  6. 2022ASQA: Factoid Questions Meet Long-Form Answerscited by 231
  7. 2021Hurdles to Progress in Long-form Question Answeringcited by 166
  8. 2019TANDA: Transfer and Adapt Pre-Trained Transformer Models for Answer Sentence Selectioncited by 74
  9. 2021Joint Passage Ranking for Diverse Multi-Answer Retrievalcited by 43
  10. 2023Asking Clarification Questions to Handle Ambiguity in Open-Domain QAcited by 24
  11. 2020Answering Ambiguous Questions through Generative Evidence Fusion and Round-Trip Predictioncited by 19
  12. 2022Query Refinement Prompts for Closed-Book Long-Form Question Answeringcited by 12
  13. 2021Answering Open-Domain Multi-Answer Questions via a Recall-then-Verify Frameworkcited by 11

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Cited by year (2026 to 7 Oct)

Citing papers per year: 2023: 2; 2024: 17; 2025: 16; 2026: 7.

42 papers.

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  1. 2023Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Large Language Models: A Surveycited by 2,185
  2. 2024From Local to Global: A Graph RAG Approach to Query-Focused Summarizationcited by 1,411
  3. 2024Retrieval-Augmented Generation for AI-Generated Content: A Surveycited by 352
  4. 2025Memory in the Age of AI Agentscited by 285
  5. 2024From Persona to Personalization: A Survey on Role-Playing Language Agentscited by 206
  6. 2023Rephrase and Respond: Let Large Language Models Ask Better Questions for Themselvescited by 123
  7. 2025Deep Research Agents: A Systematic Examination And Roadmapcited by 122
  8. 2025CollabLLM: From Passive Responders to Active Collaboratorscited by 117
  9. 2024From Matching to Generation: A Survey on Generative Information Retrievalcited by 89
  10. 2024Searching for Best Practices in Retrieval-Augmented Generationcited by 83
  11. 2025Lifelong Learning of Large Language Model based Agents: A Roadmapcited by 78
  12. 2024Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) and Beyond: A Comprehensive Survey on How to Make your LLMs use External Data More Wiselycited by 65
30 more
  1. 2024Demystifying Chains, Trees, and Graphs of Thoughtscited by 63
  2. 2024Towards Lifelong Learning of Large Language Models: A Surveycited by 60
  3. 2025Test-Time Learning for Large Language Modelscited by 46
  4. 2024A Survey of Conversational Searchcited by 22
  5. 2024AmbigDocs: Reasoning across Documents on Different Entities under the Same Namecited by 21
  6. 2024Enhancing Retrieval and Managing Retrieval: A Four-Module Synergy for Improved Quality and Efficiency in RAG Systemscited by 15
  7. 2025IC-Cache: Efficient Large Language Model Serving via In-context Cachingcited by 13
  8. 2024APTNESS: Incorporating Appraisal Theory and Emotion Support Strategies for Empathetic Response Generationcited by 12
  9. 2025A Survey of Scaling in Large Language Model Reasoningcited by 10
  10. 2025Self-Routing RAG: Binding Selective Retrieval with Knowledge Verbalizationcited by 9
  11. 2024Federated In-Context LLM Agent Learningcited by 8
  12. 2025Acknowledging Focus Ambiguity in Visual Questionscited by 7
  13. 2024A Learnable Agent Collaboration Network Framework for Personalized Multimodal AI Search Enginecited by 5
  14. 2025Learning Steerable Clarification Policies with Collaborative Self-playcited by 5
  15. 2025Exploring the Landscape of Text-to-SQL with Large Language Models: Progresses, Challenges and Opportunitiescited by 4
  16. 2025REIS: A High-Performance and Energy-Efficient Retrieval System with In-Storage Processingcited by 4
  17. 2026DiscoverLLM: From Executing Intents to Discovering Themcited by 3
  18. 2024Think-then-Act: A Dual-Angle Evaluated Retrieval-Augmented Generationcited by 2
  19. 2024A Survey of Query Optimization in Large Language Modelscited by 1
  20. 2025Oreo: A Plug-in Context Reconstructor to Enhance Retrieval-Augmented Generationcited by 1
  21. 2025ABC: Achieving Better Control of Multimodal Embeddings using VLMscited by 1
  22. 2025Thinking About Thinking: SAGE-nano's Inverse Reasoning for Self-Aware Language Modelscited by 1
  23. 2025Leveraging Spreading Activation for Improved Document Retrieval in Knowledge-Graph-Based RAG Systemscited by 1
  24. 2024End-to-End Trainable Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Relation Extractioncited by 0
  25. 2026Query Suggestion for Retrieval-Augmented Generation via Dynamic In-Context Learningcited by 0
  26. 2026Attribution Techniques for Mitigating Hallucinated Information in RAG Systems: A Surveycited by 0
  27. 2026PleaSQLarify: Visual Pragmatic Repair for Natural Language Database Queryingcited by 0
  28. 2026LLM-as-an-Investigator: Evidence-First Reasoning for Robust Interactive Problem Diagnosiscited by 0
  29. 2026RSF-GLLM: Bridging the Semantic Gap in Multi-Hop Knowledge Graph QA via Recurrent Soft-Flow and Decoupled LLM Generationcited by 0
  30. 2026Mapping the RAG Landscape: A Four Axis Taxonomy of Efficiency, Defense, Interactivity, and Reasoningcited by 0

Similar, not cited

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  1. 2025TreeRare: Syntax Tree-Guided Retrieval and Reasoning for Knowledge-Intensive Question Answering
  2. 2025DEEPAMBIGQA: Ambiguous Multi-hop Questions for Benchmarking LLM Answer Completeness
  3. 2026Diversity is Not Ambiguity: Toward Accurate and Efficient Ambiguity Detection for Open-Domain QA
  4. 2022Entailment Tree Explanations via Iterative Retrieval-Generation Reasoner
  5. 2025Disambiguation in Conversational Question Answering in the Era of LLMs and Agents: A Survey
  6. 2026RAC: Retrieval-Augmented Clarification for Faithful Conversational Search
  7. 2026Inferential Question Answering
  8. 2026ASTRA: Adaptive Semantic Tree Reasoning Architecture for Complex Table Question Answering