🤖 AI Summary
Current information retrieval systems struggle with complex queries requiring logical constraints, multi-step reasoning, and evidence synthesis, primarily due to a lack of structured reasoning capabilities. This work proposes the first unified framework for structured reasoning in information retrieval, systematically integrating interdisciplinary approaches—including large language model reasoning strategies, neuro-symbolic systems, probabilistic and Bayesian methods, geometric representations, and energy-based models—to elucidate their inherent trade-offs and complementary mechanisms. By bridging disciplinary boundaries, the framework clarifies the central role of retrieval within general-purpose reasoning systems and provides researchers with conceptual tools and practical guidance to advance the development of verifiable, structured reasoning architectures.
📝 Abstract
Information retrieval has long focused on ranking documents by semantic relatedness. Yet many real-world information needs demand more: enforcement of logical constraints, multi-step inference, and synthesis of multiple pieces of evidence. Addressing these requirements is, at its core, a problem of reasoning. Across AI communities, researchers are developing diverse solutions for the problem of reasoning, from inference-time strategies and post-training of LLMs, to neuro-symbolic systems, Bayesian and probabilistic frameworks, geometric representations, and energy-based models. These efforts target the same problem: to move beyond pattern-matching systems toward structured, verifiable inference. However, they remain scattered across disciplines, making it difficult for IR researchers to identify the most relevant ideas and opportunities. To help navigate the fragmented landscape of research in reasoning, this tutorial first articulates a working definition of reasoning within the context of information retrieval and derives from it a unified analytical framework. The framework maps existing approaches along axes that reflect the core components of the definition. By providing a comprehensive overview of recent approaches and mapping current methods onto the defined axes, we expose their trade-offs and complementarities, highlight where IR can benefit from cross-disciplinary advances, and illustrate how retrieval process itself can play a central role in broader reasoning systems. The tutorial will equip participants with both a conceptual framework and practical guidance for enhancing reasoning-capable IR systems, while situating IR as a domain that both benefits and contributes to the broader development of reasoning methodologies.