Citation
Asking a model to reference specific sources or quote passages from documents when making claims.
Think of it like
Like academic footnotes: every claim points back to where it came from.
Example
"According to *Document A, page 3*: 'The policy took effect January 1.'" vs. just "The policy took effect January 1."
How it actually works
Citations reduce hallucination when grounding is available (e.g., with RAG). The model outputs text and source spans. This is harder than it sounds: the model must track which input came from where, and synthesized or paraphrased text breaks naive citation. Some approaches use token-level attention or explicit prompting to force citation.
For product teams
Builds trust. Users see where facts come from. Regulatory requirement in some industries.
For engineers
Prompt with structured input marking source boundaries. Parse output to extract quotes + source refs. Validate that quotes actually appear in the source.
Related
- RAG — Works best with RAG and grounding.
- Hallucination — Reduces hallucination.
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