Multi-Estimate Elicitation Does Not Uniformly Debias Language Model Judgments
AI 摘要
Does eliciting five weighted estimates within a single response change how a language model responds to information? Across anchoring, hindsight, base-rate, conjunction, and status-quo/default tasks, we compare direct numerical answers with a multi-estimate response format, contrasting source framings, explicitly random cues, and probability-consistency constraints. We evaluate three completed configurations--gpt-6.1-sol, claude-sonnet-5.5, and Qwen3-8B (reasoning disabled, analyzed descriptively). In the first two configurations, direct elicitation yielded near-zero irrelevant-anchor indices and status-quo effects, while remaining responsive to informative sources and informed advice. Of 23 preregistered confirmatory tests, six rejected after Holm adjustment; however, all six absolute point estimates fell below their prespecified smallest effect sizes of interest without establishing equivalence. Moreover, while separate versus joint elicitation shifted conjunction judgments, interpretation is constrained by between-call noise. Ultimately, multi-estimate elicitation failed to produce uniform debiasing or response attenuation across tasks and models, though post hoc correlations between candidate spread and anchoring error motivate independent predictive validation. Materials: https://github.com/asj252/llm-judgment-studies