Adaptive Graph of Thoughts: Test-Time Adaptive Reasoning Unifying Chain, Tree, and Graph Structures

Large Language Models (LLMs) have demonstrated impressive reasoning capabilities, yet their performance is highly dependent on the prompting strategy and model scale. While reinforcement learning and fine-tuning have been deployed to boost reasoning, these approaches incur substantial computational and data overhead. In this work, we introduce Adaptive Graph of Thoughts (AGoT), a dynamic, graph-based inference framework that enhances LLM reasoning solely at test time. Rather than relying on fixed-step methods like Chain of Thought (CoT) or Tree of Thoughts (ToT), AGoT recursively decomposes complex queries into structured subproblems, forming an dynamic directed acyclic graph (DAG) of interdependent reasoning steps. By selectively expanding only those subproblems that require further analysis, AGoT unifies the strengths of chain, tree, and graph paradigms into a cohesive framework that allocates computation where it is most needed. We validate our approach on diverse benchmarks spanning multi-hop retrieval, scientific reasoning, and mathematical problem-solving, achieving up to 46.2% improvement on scientific reasoning tasks (GPQA) - comparable to gains achieved through computationally intensive reinforcement learning approaches and outperforming state-of-the-art iterative approaches. These results suggest that dynamic decomposition and structured recursion offer a scalable, cost-effective alternative to post-training modifications, paving the way for more robust, general-purpose reasoning in LLMs.

On the Reasoning Capacity of AI Models and How to Quantify It

Recent advances in Large Language Models (LLMs) have intensified the debate surrounding the fundamental nature of their reasoning capabilities. While achieving high performance on benchmarks such as GPQA and MMLU, these models exhibit limitations in more complex reasoning tasks, highlighting the need for more rigorous evaluation methodologies. We propose a novel phenomenological approach that goes beyond traditional accuracy metrics to probe the underlying mechanisms of model behavior, establishing a framework that could broadly impact how we analyze and understand AI systems. Using positional bias in multiple-choice reasoning tasks as a case study, we demonstrate how systematic perturbations can reveal fundamental aspects of model decision-making. To analyze these behaviors, we develop two complementary phenomenological models: a Probabilistic Mixture Model (PMM) that decomposes model responses into reasoning, memorization, and guessing components and an Information-Theoretic Consistency (ITC) analysis that quantifies the relationship between model confidence and strategy selection. Through controlled experiments on reasoning benchmarks, we show that true reasoning remains challenging for current models, with apparent success often relying on sophisticated combinations of memorization and pattern matching rather than genuine logical deduction. More fundamentally, we demonstrate that accuracy alone often overstates a model's reasoning abilities, as model behavior can be characterized through underlying mechanisms in the phase space of cognitive strategies, revealing how models dynamically balance different approaches when responding to queries. This framework enables quantitative criteria for real-world deployments, allowing applications to specify reliability thresholds based on strategy distributions rather than aggregate performance metrics.

Composite Learning Units: Generalized Learning Beyond Parameter Updates to Transform LLMs into Adaptive Reasoners

Human learning thrives on the ability to learn from mistakes, adapt through feedback, and refine understanding-processes often missing in static machine learning models. In this work, we introduce Composite Learning Units (CLUs) designed to transform reasoners, such as Large Language Models (LLMs), into learners capable of generalized, continuous learning without conventional parameter updates while enhancing their reasoning abilities through continual interaction and feedback. CLUs are built on an architecture that allows a reasoning model to maintain and evolve a dynamic knowledge repository: a General Knowledge Space for broad, reusable insights and a Prompt-Specific Knowledge Space for task-specific learning. Through goal-driven interactions, CLUs iteratively refine these knowledge spaces, enabling the system to adapt dynamically to complex tasks, extract nuanced insights, and build upon past experiences autonomously. We demonstrate CLUs' effectiveness through a cryptographic reasoning task, where they continuously evolve their understanding through feedback to uncover hidden transformation rules. While conventional models struggle to grasp underlying logic, CLUs excel by engaging in an iterative, goal-oriented process. Specialized components-handling knowledge retrieval, prompt generation, and feedback analysis-work together within a reinforcing feedback loop. This approach allows CLUs to retain the memory of past failures and successes, adapt autonomously, and apply sophisticated reasoning effectively, continually learning from mistakes while also building on breakthroughs.