The paper investigates how large language models learn new tasks in-context, comparing rule-based instruction following to example-based few-shot prompting across five diverse tasks. Results show that models generally learn more reliably from rule descriptions than from examples alone, and adding more examples does not consistently improve performance. Instruction tuning further enhances rule-based learning while preserving example-based capabilities, with rule advantages being strongest for algebraic tasks and weaker for tasks requiring distributional sensitivity or parametric knowledge.
By Xiang Fu, Seungmin Cho, Yukyung Lee, Najoung Kim
arXiv:2610.35111v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Large language models operationalize an intuitive, view of meaning as use. We argue that it faces a rule-following challenge. Using Kripke's interpreta...
By Niyar R Barman, Omar Naim, Nicholas Asher
arXiv:2609.00759v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) increasingly handle in-context learning (ICL) tasks where a long, novel context defines the rules, knowledge, and output s...
By Jinhu Qi, Minda Hu, Wentao Zhang, Weiqiang Jin, Yanyu Chen, Junli Wang, Irwin King
arXiv:2601.03199v2 Announce Type: replace-cross
Abstract: Diffusion language models (DLMs) have shown strong potential for general natural language tasks with in-context examples. Existing In-Context...
By Yang Li, Han Meng, Chenan Wang, Zhenyu Bi, Xuan Wang, Haipeng Chen
arXiv:2606. 27721v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Compositional generalization, the ability to solve complex problems by combining solutions to simpler sub-problems, is a fundamental capability of both natural and artificial intelligence, and a key mechanism underlying chain-of-thought reasoning.
By Nived Rajaraman, Audrey Huang, Miroslav Dudik, Robert Schapire, Dylan Foster, Akshay Krishnamurthy
arXiv:2606. 26935v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Chain-of-thought (CoT) reasoning is widely used in language-model agents, but prior work has shown that verbalized CoT is not always faithful and may instead reflect post-hoc reasoning, which means the model already knows the answer before reasoning.
By Jingyu Liu, Zhiwen Wang, Yuxin Jing, Huanyu Zhou, Yong Liu