Catch Me if You Search: When Contextual Web Search Results Affect the Detection of Hallucinations

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Nahar, Mahjabin, Lee, Eun-Ju, Park, Jin Won, Lee, Dongwon
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2025
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author Nahar, Mahjabin
Lee, Eun-Ju
Park, Jin Won
Lee, Dongwon
author_facet Nahar, Mahjabin
Lee, Eun-Ju
Park, Jin Won
Lee, Dongwon
contents While we increasingly rely on large language models (LLMs) for various tasks, these models are known to produce inaccurate content or 'hallucinations' with potentially disastrous consequences. The recent integration of web search results into LLMs prompts the question of whether people utilize them to verify the generated content, thereby accurately detecting hallucinations. An online experiment (N=560) investigated how the provision of search results, either static (i.e., fixed search results provided by LLM) or dynamic (i.e., participant-led searches), affects participants' perceived accuracy of LLM-generated content (i.e., genuine, minor hallucination, major hallucination), self-confidence in accuracy ratings, as well as their overall evaluation of the LLM, as compared to the control condition (i.e., no search results). Results showed that participants in both static and dynamic conditions (vs. control) rated hallucinated content to be less accurate and perceived the LLM more negatively. However, those in the dynamic condition rated genuine content as more accurate and demonstrated greater overall self-confidence in their assessments than those in the static search or control conditions. We highlighted practical implications of incorporating web search functionality into LLMs in real-world contexts.
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id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2504_01153
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publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Catch Me if You Search: When Contextual Web Search Results Affect the Detection of Hallucinations
Nahar, Mahjabin
Lee, Eun-Ju
Park, Jin Won
Lee, Dongwon
Human-Computer Interaction
Artificial Intelligence
Machine Learning
While we increasingly rely on large language models (LLMs) for various tasks, these models are known to produce inaccurate content or 'hallucinations' with potentially disastrous consequences. The recent integration of web search results into LLMs prompts the question of whether people utilize them to verify the generated content, thereby accurately detecting hallucinations. An online experiment (N=560) investigated how the provision of search results, either static (i.e., fixed search results provided by LLM) or dynamic (i.e., participant-led searches), affects participants' perceived accuracy of LLM-generated content (i.e., genuine, minor hallucination, major hallucination), self-confidence in accuracy ratings, as well as their overall evaluation of the LLM, as compared to the control condition (i.e., no search results). Results showed that participants in both static and dynamic conditions (vs. control) rated hallucinated content to be less accurate and perceived the LLM more negatively. However, those in the dynamic condition rated genuine content as more accurate and demonstrated greater overall self-confidence in their assessments than those in the static search or control conditions. We highlighted practical implications of incorporating web search functionality into LLMs in real-world contexts.
title Catch Me if You Search: When Contextual Web Search Results Affect the Detection of Hallucinations
topic Human-Computer Interaction
Artificial Intelligence
Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.01153