Separating Semantic Competition from Context Length in RAG Reading
Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) systems can respond incorrectly even when the correct passage was retrieved. The model must still read the retrieved passages and identify which one contains the answer among others that look relevant. This passage-reading model is called the reader. Does it fail simply because the context is longer or because the other passages genuinely compete with the correct one? We introduce and demonstrate a matched-control protocol for RAG reading: we keep the number and length of passages fixed, but replace hard competitors with less competitive real passages. We apply this control across two compact open models on SQuAD. This replacement partially restores pe...
| Authors | Vyzantinos Repantis, Ameya Gawde, Harshvardhan Singh et al. |
|---|---|
| Primary category | cs.CL |
| Published | 26 May 2026 |
| Last updated at source | 26 May 2026 |
Silytics shows public metadata from arXiv and links to the original. Information may be incomplete or out of date. Last refreshed 17 October 2026. Licenses and terms of the original apply to the work itself. Not financial, legal or professional advice.