Boosting LLM Reasoning via Spontaneous Self-Correction

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Zhao, Xutong, Xu, Tengyu, Wang, Xuewei, Chen, Zhengxing, Jin, Di, Tan, Liang, Yen-Ting, Yu, Zishun, Zhao, Zhuokai, He, Yun, Wang, Sinong, Fang, Han, Chandar, Sarath, Zhu, Chen
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Zhao, Xutong
Xu, Tengyu
Wang, Xuewei
Chen, Zhengxing
Jin, Di
Tan, Liang
Yen-Ting
Yu, Zishun
Zhao, Zhuokai
He, Yun
Wang, Sinong
Fang, Han
Chandar, Sarath
Zhu, Chen
author_facet Zhao, Xutong
Xu, Tengyu
Wang, Xuewei
Chen, Zhengxing
Jin, Di
Tan, Liang
Yen-Ting
Yu, Zishun
Zhao, Zhuokai
He, Yun
Wang, Sinong
Fang, Han
Chandar, Sarath
Zhu, Chen
contents While large language models (LLMs) have demonstrated remarkable success on a broad range of tasks, math reasoning remains a challenging one. One of the approaches for improving math reasoning is self-correction, which designs self-improving loops to let the model correct its own mistakes. However, existing self-correction approaches treat corrections as standalone post-generation refinements, relying on extra prompt and system designs to elicit self-corrections, instead of performing real-time, spontaneous self-corrections in a single pass. To address this, we propose SPOC, a spontaneous self-correction approach that enables LLMs to generate interleaved solutions and verifications in a single inference pass, with generation dynamically terminated based on verification outcomes, thereby effectively scaling inference time compute. SPOC considers a multi-agent perspective by assigning dual roles -- solution proposer and verifier -- to the same model. We adopt a simple yet effective approach to generate synthetic data for fine-tuning, enabling the model to develop capabilities for self-verification and multi-agent collaboration. We further improve its solution proposal and verification accuracy through online reinforcement learning. Experiments on mathematical reasoning benchmarks show that SPOC significantly improves performance. Notably, SPOC boosts the accuracy of Llama-3.1-8B and 70B Instruct models, achieving gains of 8.8% and 11.6% on MATH500, 10.0% and 20.0% on AMC23, and 3.3% and 6.7% on AIME24, respectively.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_06923
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Boosting LLM Reasoning via Spontaneous Self-Correction
Zhao, Xutong
Xu, Tengyu
Wang, Xuewei
Chen, Zhengxing
Jin, Di
Tan, Liang
Yen-Ting
Yu, Zishun
Zhao, Zhuokai
He, Yun
Wang, Sinong
Fang, Han
Chandar, Sarath
Zhu, Chen
Artificial Intelligence
While large language models (LLMs) have demonstrated remarkable success on a broad range of tasks, math reasoning remains a challenging one. One of the approaches for improving math reasoning is self-correction, which designs self-improving loops to let the model correct its own mistakes. However, existing self-correction approaches treat corrections as standalone post-generation refinements, relying on extra prompt and system designs to elicit self-corrections, instead of performing real-time, spontaneous self-corrections in a single pass. To address this, we propose SPOC, a spontaneous self-correction approach that enables LLMs to generate interleaved solutions and verifications in a single inference pass, with generation dynamically terminated based on verification outcomes, thereby effectively scaling inference time compute. SPOC considers a multi-agent perspective by assigning dual roles -- solution proposer and verifier -- to the same model. We adopt a simple yet effective approach to generate synthetic data for fine-tuning, enabling the model to develop capabilities for self-verification and multi-agent collaboration. We further improve its solution proposal and verification accuracy through online reinforcement learning. Experiments on mathematical reasoning benchmarks show that SPOC significantly improves performance. Notably, SPOC boosts the accuracy of Llama-3.1-8B and 70B Instruct models, achieving gains of 8.8% and 11.6% on MATH500, 10.0% and 20.0% on AMC23, and 3.3% and 6.7% on AIME24, respectively.
title Boosting LLM Reasoning via Spontaneous Self-Correction
topic Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.06923