Enhancing Mathematical Reasoning in Large Language Models with Self-Consistency-Based Hallucination Detection
On the map: LLM reasoning → Mathematical reasoning
Abstract (arXiv)
Large language models (LLMs) have demonstrated strong mathematical reasoning capabilities but remain susceptible to hallucinations producing plausible yet incorrect statements especially in theorem proving, symbolic manipulation, and numerical computation. While self-consistency (SC) has been explored as a means to improve factuality in LLMs, existing approaches primarily apply SC to final-answer selection, neglecting the logical consistency of intermediate reasoning steps. In this work, we introduce a structured self-consistency framework designed to enhance the reliability of mathematical reasoning. Our method enforces self-consistency across intermediate steps and final outputs, reducing logical inconsistencies and hallucinations. We evaluate our approach across three core mathematical tasks: theorem proving, symbolic transformation, and numerical computation. Experimental results demonstrate that SC significantly improves proof validity, symbolic reasoning accuracy, and numerical stability while maintaining computational efficiency. Further analysis reveals that structured self-consistency not only enhances problem-solving accuracy but also reduces the variance of model-generated outputs. These findings highlight self-consistency as a robust mechanism for improving mathematical reasoning in LLMs, paving the way for more reliable and interpretable AI-driven mathematics.
Key facts. Cited by 13 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026). Placed in Mathematical reasoning, one of 17 directions in LLM reasoning. Builds on 19 of its 45 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 13 Apr 2025.
Builds on
19 of 45 references.
References · 19
- 2023Let's Verify Step by Stepcited by 3,789
- 2022Training a Helpful and Harmless Assistant with Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedbackcited by 3,720
- 2024LiveCodeBench: Holistic and Contamination Free Evaluation of Large Language Models for Codecited by 2,004
- 2023A Survey on Hallucination in Large Language Models: Principles, Taxonomy, Challenges, and Open Questionscited by 1,601
- 2024OlympiadBench: A Challenging Benchmark for Promoting AGI with Olympiad-Level Bilingual Multimodal Scientific Problemscited by 1,136
- 2024Large Language Monkeys: Scaling Inference Compute with Repeated Samplingcited by 991
- 2023Math-Shepherd: Verify and Reinforce LLMs Step-by-step without Human Annotationscited by 928
- 2024Inference Scaling Laws: An Empirical Analysis of Compute-Optimal Inference for Problem-Solving with Language Modelscited by 290
- 2024Semantic Entropy Probes: Robust and Cheap Hallucination Detection in LLMscited by 259
- 2024DeepSeek-Prover: Advancing Theorem Proving in LLMs through Large-Scale Synthetic Datacited by 234
- 2023Universal Self-Consistency for Large Language Model Generationcited by 203
- 2024Lookback Lens: Detecting and Mitigating Contextual Hallucinations in Large Language Models Using Only Attention Mapscited by 142
7 more
- 2024Critique-out-Loud Reward Modelscited by 106
- 2024TruthX: Alleviating Hallucinations by Editing Large Language Models in Truthful Spacecited by 91
- 2023Halo: Estimation and Reduction of Hallucinations in Open-Source Weak Large Language Modelscited by 36
- 2024DRT: Deep Reasoning Translation via Long Chain-of-Thoughtcited by 29
- 2024Constructing Benchmarks and Interventions for Combating Hallucinations in LLMscited by 19
- 2024Mapping the Neuro-Symbolic AI Landscape by Architectures: A Handbook on Augmenting Deep Learning Through Symbolic Reasoningcited by 13
- 2024GloSoFarID: Global multispectral dataset for Solar Farm IDentification in satellite imagerycited by 2
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Citing papers per year: 2025: 7; 2026: 6.
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- 2025LLM-based Agents Suffer from Hallucinations: A Survey of Taxonomy, Methods, and Directionscited by 50
- 2025RoT: Enhancing Table Reasoning with Iterative Row-Wise Traversalscited by 10
- 2025Learning-at-Criticality in Large Language Models for Quantum Field Theory and Beyondcited by 5
- 2025ConfClip: Confidence-Weighted and Clipped Reward for Reinforcement Learning in LLMscited by 5
- 2026Why Your Deep Research Agent Fails? On Hallucination Evaluation in Full Research Trajectorycited by 5
- 2026PRISM: Probing Reasoning, Instruction, and Source Memory in LLM Hallucinationscited by 4
- 2025SynPO: Synergizing Descriptiveness and Preference Optimization for Video Detailed Captioningcited by 3
- 2026OptArgus: A Multi-Agent System to Detect Hallucinations in LLM-based Optimization Modelingcited by 3
- 2026Do I Really Know? Learning Factual Self-Verification for Hallucination Reductioncited by 2
- 2025Reflective Confidence: Correcting Reasoning Flaws via Online Self-Correctioncited by 1
- 2026Evaluating Large Language Models on Solved and Unsolved Problems in Graph Theory: Implications for Computing Educationcited by 1
- 2025From Proof to Program: Characterizing Tool-Induced Reasoning Hallucinations in Large Language Modelscited by 0
- 2026OptArgus: A Multi-Agent System to Detect Hallucinations in LLM-based Optimization Modeling12 May 2026
- 2026PRISM: Probing Reasoning, Instruction, and Source Memory in LLM Hallucinations18 Apr 2026
- 2026Magic, Madness, Heaven, Sin: LLM Output Diversity is Everything, Everywhere, All at Once2 Apr 2026
- 2026Evaluating Large Language Models on Solved and Unsolved Problems in Graph Theory: Implications for Computing Education4 Feb 2026
- 2026Do I Really Know? Learning Factual Self-Verification for Hallucination Reduction2 Feb 2026
- 2026Why Your Deep Research Agent Fails? On Hallucination Evaluation in Full Research Trajectory30 Jan 2026
- 2025Reflective Confidence: Correcting Reasoning Flaws via Online Self-Correction21 Dec 2025
- 2025From Proof to Program: Characterizing Tool-Induced Reasoning Hallucinations in Large Language Models14 Nov 2025
- 2025LLM-based Agents Suffer from Hallucinations: A Survey of Taxonomy, Methods, and Directions23 Sep 2025
- 2025ConfClip: Confidence-Weighted and Clipped Reward for Reinforcement Learning in LLMs22 Sep 2025
- 2025Learning-at-Criticality in Large Language Models for Quantum Field Theory and Beyond4 Jun 2025
- 2025SynPO: Synergizing Descriptiveness and Preference Optimization for Video Detailed Captioning1 Jun 2025
1 more
- 2025RoT: Enhancing Table Reasoning with Iterative Row-Wise Traversalscited by 10
- 2026PRISM: Probing Reasoning, Instruction, and Source Memory in LLM Hallucinationscited by 4
- 2025Reflective Confidence: Correcting Reasoning Flaws via Online Self-Correctioncited by 1
- 2025From Proof to Program: Characterizing Tool-Induced Reasoning Hallucinations in Large Language Modelscited by 0
- 2026PRISM: Probing Reasoning, Instruction, and Source Memory in LLM Hallucinations18 Apr 2026
- 2025Reflective Confidence: Correcting Reasoning Flaws via Online Self-Correction21 Dec 2025
- 2025From Proof to Program: Characterizing Tool-Induced Reasoning Hallucinations in Large Language Models14 Nov 2025
- 2025RoT: Enhancing Table Reasoning with Iterative Row-Wise Traversals21 May 2025
- 2025LLM-based Agents Suffer from Hallucinations: A Survey of Taxonomy, Methods, and Directionscited by 50
- 2026Why Your Deep Research Agent Fails? On Hallucination Evaluation in Full Research Trajectorycited by 5
- 2026OptArgus: A Multi-Agent System to Detect Hallucinations in LLM-based Optimization Modelingcited by 3
- 2026OptArgus: A Multi-Agent System to Detect Hallucinations in LLM-based Optimization Modeling12 May 2026
- 2026Why Your Deep Research Agent Fails? On Hallucination Evaluation in Full Research Trajectory30 Jan 2026
- 2025LLM-based Agents Suffer from Hallucinations: A Survey of Taxonomy, Methods, and Directions23 Sep 2025
- 2025Learning-at-Criticality in Large Language Models for Quantum Field Theory and Beyondcited by 5
- 2025ConfClip: Confidence-Weighted and Clipped Reward for Reinforcement Learning in LLMscited by 5
- 2026Do I Really Know? Learning Factual Self-Verification for Hallucination Reductioncited by 2
- 2026Evaluating Large Language Models on Solved and Unsolved Problems in Graph Theory: Implications for Computing Educationcited by 1
- 2026Magic, Madness, Heaven, Sin: LLM Output Diversity is Everything, Everywhere, All at Oncecited by 0
- 2026Magic, Madness, Heaven, Sin: LLM Output Diversity is Everything, Everywhere, All at Once2 Apr 2026
- 2026Evaluating Large Language Models on Solved and Unsolved Problems in Graph Theory: Implications for Computing Education4 Feb 2026
- 2026Do I Really Know? Learning Factual Self-Verification for Hallucination Reduction2 Feb 2026
- 2025ConfClip: Confidence-Weighted and Clipped Reward for Reinforcement Learning in LLMs22 Sep 2025
- 2025Learning-at-Criticality in Large Language Models for Quantum Field Theory and Beyond4 Jun 2025
Similar, not cited
Close in wording, no citation either way
- 2026Reasoning Error from Known Fact: Step-Level Self-Consistency Group Relative Policy Optimization for LLM
- 2024Embedding Self-Correction as an Inherent Ability in Large Language Models for Enhanced Mathematical Reasoning
- 2025Improving the Reliability of LLMs: Combining CoT, RAG, Self-Consistency, and Self-Verification
- 2026Does Inference Scaling Improve Reasoning Faithfulness? A Multi-Model Analysis of Self-Consistency Tradeoffs
- 2025Safe: Enhancing Mathematical Reasoning in Large Language Models via Retrospective Step-aware Formal Verification
- 2025ReliableMath: Benchmark of Reliable Mathematical Reasoning on Large Language Models
- 2025FormalMATH: Benchmarking Formal Mathematical Reasoning of Large Language Models
- 2024Not All Votes Count! Programs as Verifiers Improve Self-Consistency of Language Models for Math Reasoning