# Selective Reasoning for Typed Decision Models: When to Start, Read, and Stop

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.19644 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.19644/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 12 of its 27 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 14 Oct 2026.

## Builds on (most cited first, 12 of 12)

- [Think you have Solved Question Answering? Try ARC, the AI2 Reasoning Challenge](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.05457/) (2018)
- [s1: Simple test-time scaling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.19393/) (2025)
- [ProofWriter: Generating Implications, Proofs, and Abductive Statements over Natural Language](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.13048/) (2020)
- [Dynamic Early Exit in Reasoning Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.15895/) (2025)
- [AdaptThink: Reasoning Models Can Learn When to Think](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.13417/) (2025)
- [Thinkless: LLM Learns When to Think](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.13379/) (2025)
- [Don't Overthink it. Preferring Shorter Thinking Chains for Improved LLM Reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.17813/) (2025)
- [Learning When to Think: Shaping Adaptive Reasoning in R1-Style Models via Multi-Stage RL](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.10832/) (2025)
- [Answer Convergence as a Signal for Early Stopping in Reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.02536/) (2025)
- [Reasoning Theater: Disentangling Model Beliefs from Chain-of-Thought](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.05488/) (2026)
- [When Is Thinking Enough? Early Exit via Sufficiency Assessment for Efficient Reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.06787/) (2026)
- [When Does Learning to Stop Help? A Cost-Aware Study of Early Exits in Reasoning Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.30852/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Typed decision models need an interface that can use additional reasoning while retaining candidate outputs. We train a shared candidate-answer reader on a frozen Qwen3.5-4B backbone to unify direct decisions with on-demand, interruptible reasoning. The reader returns distributions from empty and partial reasoning prefixes. A benefit gate starts reasoning, a natural-state trigger requests explicit reads, and an entropy rule accepts acquired answers and cancels generation. Measurements distinguish answer-query work, generated output, and pipeline time. Across 768 questions from ProofWriter, LogiQA 2.0, and ARC-Challenge, accuracy rises from 70.96% for direct reading to 84.38%. Relative to 512-token terminal reading, accuracy improves by 7.29 percentage points with 2.25% more mean output work. Relative to 1,024-token terminal reading, pipeline time falls by 46.30% with an accuracy difference of -1.17 points. Exact-prefix controls isolate the saving from interruption, while read-scheduling controls distinguish reduced observation work from shorter response time.
