# Context-Robust Knowledge Editing for Language Models

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.23026 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.23026/

## Key facts

- Cited by 8 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 31 of its 42 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 29 May 2025.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 31)

- [The Llama 3 Herd of Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.21783/) (2024)
- [Llama 2: Open Foundation and Fine-Tuned Chat Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.09288/) (2023)
- [Measuring Massive Multitask Language Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2009.03300/) (2020)
- [Efficient Memory Management for Large Language Model Serving with PagedAttention](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.06180/) (2023)
- [TriviaQA: A Large Scale Distantly Supervised Challenge Dataset for Reading Comprehension](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1705.03551/) (2017)
- [Locating and Editing Factual Associations in GPT](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2202.05262/) (2022)
- [G-Eval: NLG Evaluation using GPT-4 with Better Human Alignment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.16634/) (2023)
- [LiveCodeBench: Holistic and Contamination Free Evaluation of Large Language Models for Code](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.07974/) (2024)
- [CommonsenseQA: A Question Answering Challenge Targeting Commonsense Knowledge](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1811.00937/) (2018)
- [Mass-Editing Memory in a Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2210.07229/) (2022)
- [The LAMBADA dataset: Word prediction requiring a broad discourse context](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1606.06031/) (2016)
- [Editing Factual Knowledge in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.08164/) (2021)
- [Dissecting Recall of Factual Associations in Auto-Regressive Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.14767/) (2023)
- [Memory-Based Model Editing at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.06520/) (2022)
- [Zero-Shot Relation Extraction via Reading Comprehension](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.04115/) (2017)
- [Editing Large Language Models: Problems, Methods, and Opportunities](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.13172/) (2023)
- [MQuAKE: Assessing Knowledge Editing in Language Models via Multi-Hop Questions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.14795/) (2023)
- [Can We Edit Factual Knowledge by In-Context Learning?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.12740/) (2023)
- [Aging with GRACE: Lifelong Model Editing with Discrete Key-Value Adaptors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.11031/) (2022)
- [Does Localization Inform Editing? Surprising Differences in Causality-Based Localization vs. Knowledge Editing in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.04213/) (2023)
- [Evaluating the Ripple Effects of Knowledge Editing in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.12976/) (2023)
- [Linearity of Relation Decoding in Transformer Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.09124/) (2023)
- [Transformer-Patcher: One Mistake worth One Neuron](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.09785/) (2023)
- [PMET: Precise Model Editing in a Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.08742/) (2023)
- [Model Editing at Scale leads to Gradual and Catastrophic Forgetting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.07453/) (2024)
- [Detecting Edit Failures In Large Language Models: An Improved Specificity Benchmark](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.17553/) (2023)
- [A Unified Framework for Model Editing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.14236/) (2024)
- [WikiGraphs: A Wikipedia Text - Knowledge Graph Paired Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.09556/) (2021)
- [Enhancing Multi-hop Reasoning through Knowledge Erasure in Large Language Model Editing](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.12456/) (2024)
- [Is Bigger Edit Batch Size Always Better? -- An Empirical Study on Model Editing with Llama-3](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.00664/) (2024)

## Built on by (most cited first, 8 of 8)

- [Is Model Editing Built on Sand? Revealing Its Illusory Success and Fragile Foundation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.00625/) (2025)
- [Gated Differentiable Working Memory for Long-Context Language Modeling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.12906/) (2026)
- [KnowledgeSmith: Uncovering Knowledge Updating in LLMs with Model Editing and Unlearning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.02392/) (2025)
- [SUIT: Knowledge Editing with Subspace-Aware Key-Value Mappings](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2509.24502/) (2025)
- [Knowledge Editing for Masked Diffusion Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.03924/) (2026)
- [MetaKE: Meta-Learning for Knowledge Editing Toward a Better Accuracy-Editability Trade-off](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.12677/) (2026)
- [The Tokens Remember: When Tokenization Bypasses Knowledge Editing and Unlearning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.29045/) (2026)
- [Sequential knowledge editing breaks a model's ability to tell good evidence from bad, without costing it accuracy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.29587/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Knowledge editing (KE) methods offer an efficient way to modify knowledge in large language models. Current KE evaluations typically assess editing success by considering only the edited knowledge without any preceding contexts. In real-world applications, however, preceding contexts often trigger the retrieval of the original knowledge and undermine the intended edit. To address this issue, we develop CHED -- a benchmark designed to evaluate the context robustness of KE methods. Evaluations on CHED show that they often fail when preceding contexts are present. To mitigate this shortcoming, we introduce CoRE, a KE method designed to strengthen context robustness by minimizing context-sensitive variance in hidden states of the model for edited knowledge. This method not only improves the editing success rate in situations where a preceding context is present but also preserves the overall capabilities of the model. We provide an in-depth analysis of the differing impacts of preceding contexts when introduced as user utterances versus assistant responses, and we dissect attention-score patterns to assess how specific tokens influence editing success.