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AI Engineering Academy · 课时

自我纠错与反思式提示

实现一个反思步骤,让智能体根据最初目标检查自己的输出,找出遗漏或错误,并在重试前生成修正后的计划。

自我纠错与反思式提示 是 CoddyKit 上的免费 AI Engineering Academy 课时。 这是第 2 节课,共 4 节。 你可以在下方免费阅读本课时的完整内容 — 然后在浏览器中使用内置代码编辑器和全天候 AI 导师进行实践。 这是 AI Engineering Academy 学习路径的一部分,你的进度在网页和 CoddyKit 应用中同步。 AI Engineering Academy 课程共包含 4 节课。

本课时的部分内容尚未翻译,以英文显示。

What Is Reflective Prompting?

Reflective prompting is a technique where the agent is asked to evaluate its own output before finalizing it. Instead of producing an answer and stopping, the agent reviews its response against the original goal, identifies gaps or errors, and generates a corrected version. This mimics how humans proofread their own work and significantly improves output quality on complex tasks without requiring a separate critic model.

The Reflect-and-Revise Loop

The basic reflective loop has three steps: Generate an initial response, Critique that response against clear criteria, and Revise based on the critique. This loop can run one or more times. Each iteration improves the response until either the critique declares it satisfactory or a maximum revision count is reached. The critique step is itself an LLM call with a specialized reflection prompt.

async def reflect_and_revise(task: str, max_rounds: int = 2) -> str:
    response = await generate_initial(task)
    for round_num in range(max_rounds):
        critique = await critique_response(task, response)
        if critique.is_satisfactory:
            break
        response = await revise_response(task, response, critique.feedback)
    return response

Writing an Effective Critique Prompt

The critique prompt must specify concrete evaluation criteria rather than asking the model to simply 'improve' the response. List the specific things to check: Is every claim accurate? Did it answer all parts of the question? Is any step missing? Is there unnecessary padding? A critique prompt with explicit checklist items produces actionable feedback that the revision step can use directly.

CRITIQUE_PROMPT = '''
You are reviewing an AI-generated response to this task: {task}

Response to evaluate:
{response}

Check each criterion and provide specific feedback:
1. COMPLETENESS: Does it address all parts of the task?
2. ACCURACY: Are all factual claims correct?
3. CONCISENESS: Is there unnecessary padding or repetition?
4. FORMAT: Does it match the requested output format?
5. ACTIONABILITY: Can the user act on this response?

For each issue found, state exactly what to fix.
If the response is satisfactory on all criteria, say APPROVE.
'''

Parsing the Critique Response

Structure the critique output as a Pydantic model so you can programmatically decide whether to revise. The is_satisfactory field determines loop exit. The issues list tells the revision step exactly what to fix. The severity field lets you skip revision for minor stylistic issues while always revising for factual errors.

from pydantic import BaseModel
from typing import List, Literal

class Issue(BaseModel):
    criterion: str
    description: str
    severity: Literal['critical', 'moderate', 'minor']

class Critique(BaseModel):
    is_satisfactory: bool
    issues: List[Issue]
    overall_verdict: str

# is_satisfactory=True means no revision needed
# is_satisfactory=False means issues must be addressed

The Revision Prompt

The revision prompt receives the original task, the initial response, and the critique feedback. Ask the model to produce an improved version that specifically addresses each issue identified by the critique, while preserving the correct parts of the original response. Always include the word 'only' to prevent the model from making unnecessary changes to things the critique already approved.

def build_revision_prompt(task: str, response: str, critique: Critique) -> str:
    issues_text = '\n'.join(
        f'- [{i.severity.upper()}] {i.criterion}: {i.description}'
        for i in critique.issues
    )
    return f'''
Original task: {task}

Your previous response:
{response}

Issues to fix:
{issues_text}

Write an improved response that fixes ONLY the issues listed above.
Do not change parts that were not flagged as problems.
'''

Self-Correction for Code Generation

Self-correction is especially powerful for code generation. After generating code, run a linter or type checker on it, feed the error output back to the model, and ask it to fix the errors. This execution-grounded reflection is more reliable than language-only critique because the feedback comes from an objective tool rather than another LLM judgment.

import subprocess
import sys

async def self_correct_code(task: str, max_rounds: int = 3) -> str:
    code = await generate_code(task)
    for _ in range(max_rounds):
        # Write code to temp file and run mypy
        with open('/tmp/agent_code.py', 'w') as f:
            f.write(code)
        result = subprocess.run(
            [sys.executable, '-m', 'mypy', '/tmp/agent_code.py', '--ignore-missing-imports'],
            capture_output=True, text=True
        )
        if result.returncode == 0:
            break  # No type errors
        code = await fix_code(code, result.stdout + result.stderr)
    return code

Avoiding Overcorrection

A common failure in reflective systems is overcorrection: the model makes the original problem worse while trying to fix something else. Mitigate this by limiting the revision scope: the revision prompt should explicitly say 'do not change anything that was not flagged.' Also compare the revised response to the original using a diff-check — if the revised version is radically different, something went wrong and you should keep the original.

from difflib import SequenceMatcher

def safe_revision(original: str, revised: str, max_change_ratio: float = 0.7) -> str:
    similarity = SequenceMatcher(None, original, revised).ratio()
    if similarity < (1 - max_change_ratio):
        print(f'Revision changed too much (similarity: {similarity:.2f}). Keeping original.')
        return original
    return revised

Reflection in Multi-Step Agent Tasks

In a multi-step agent, add a reflection checkpoint after completing a set of steps — for example, after gathering all research but before writing the final report. The agent reviews what it has collected, identifies gaps, and decides whether to gather more information or proceed. This mid-task reflection prevents agents from proceeding to the synthesis step with incomplete or contradictory evidence.

async def research_with_reflection(question: str) -> str:
    # Phase 1: gather evidence
    evidence = await gather_evidence(question)

    # Reflection checkpoint
    assessment = await assess_evidence_completeness(question, evidence)
    if not assessment.is_complete:
        for gap in assessment.gaps:
            more_evidence = await targeted_search(gap.search_query)
            evidence.extend(more_evidence)

    # Phase 2: synthesize
    return await synthesize_answer(question, evidence)

Logging Reflection Outcomes

Log every reflection round: the critique scores, which issues were identified, and whether the revision actually resolved them. This data reveals whether your reflection prompts are effective. If the revised response consistently re-introduces the same issues the critique flagged, your revision prompt is not specific enough. If most critiques say 'APPROVE' on the first round, the initial generation quality is already high and reflection overhead may not be worth the cost.

import structlog

log = structlog.get_logger()

def log_reflection_round(task_id: str, round_num: int, critique: Critique, action: str):
    log.info(
        'reflection_round',
        task_id=task_id,
        round=round_num,
        is_satisfactory=critique.is_satisfactory,
        issue_count=len(critique.issues),
        critical_issues=sum(1 for i in critique.issues if i.severity == 'critical'),
        action=action  # 'approved', 'revised', 'max_rounds_reached'
    )

When to Use Reflection

Reflection adds latency and cost — a two-round reflect-and-revise at least triples the number of LLM calls for that task. Use reflection selectively: always for high-stakes outputs (code that will run, answers to consequential business questions), optionally for user-facing responses, and never for internal intermediate steps that will be immediately verified by a tool. The cost is worth it when quality matters more than speed.

# Reflection decision matrix:
# Task type:              Use reflection?
# SQL query generation    YES (run+verify)
# Final report writing    YES (review before delivery)
# Tool argument prep      NO  (tool result verifies it)
# Short factual answer    MAYBE (if accuracy is critical)
# Internal agent thought  NO   (intermediate, not final)
# Code generation         YES  (run linter/tests)

USE_REFLECTION = {'report', 'code', 'email', 'analysis'}

Measuring Reflection Effectiveness

Track whether reflection actually improves your outputs by running A/B tests: process a random 50% of tasks with reflection and 50% without, then judge both sets with your LLM judge. If the reflective group scores significantly higher (and the improvement exceeds the additional latency and cost), reflection is paying off. If scores are similar, your initial generation quality is already high enough and reflection is adding overhead without benefit.

async def reflection_ab_test(tasks: list) -> dict:
    import random
    results = {'with_reflection': [], 'without_reflection': []}
    for task in tasks:
        if random.random() < 0.5:
            response = await reflect_and_revise(task, max_rounds=2)
            group = 'with_reflection'
        else:
            response = await generate_initial(task)
            group = 'without_reflection'
        score = await judge(task, response)
        results[group].append(score.overall)
    return {
        'mean_with': sum(results['with_reflection']) / len(results['with_reflection']),
        'mean_without': sum(results['without_reflection']) / len(results['without_reflection'])
    }

Quick Check

Test your understanding of self-correction and reflective prompting in agents.

Lesson Recap

In this lesson you learned: reflect-and-revise loops improve output quality by having the agent critique and fix its own responses, concrete critique rubrics produce actionable feedback rather than vague improvement suggestions, and execution-grounded reflection with objective tools like linters is especially powerful for code generation. Next up we implement agent checkpointing and task resumption.

常见问题解答

「自我纠错与反思式提示」课时是免费的吗?

是的 — 「自我纠错与反思式提示」的完整文本可在网页上免费阅读。要进行交互式练习(内置代码编辑器和全天候 AI 导师)并解锁 AI Engineering Academy 课程的其余内容,请升级到 CoddyKit PRO。 AI Engineering Academy 课程共包含 4 节课。

「自我纠错与反思式提示」这节课中我会学到什么?

实现一个反思步骤,让智能体根据最初目标检查自己的输出,找出遗漏或错误,并在重试前生成修正后的计划。 你通过在浏览器中直接运行的动手代码来练习 AI Engineering Academy,全天候 AI 导师会在你学习这节课的过程中回答你的问题。

学习 AI Engineering Academy 需要有经验吗?

无需任何先前经验。CoddyKit 上的 AI Engineering Academy 课程适合初学者到高级学习者,你可以从这里开始或从头开始,按照自己的节奏学习。 这是第 2 节课,共 4 节。

「自我纠错与反思式提示」课时需要多长时间?

大多数 CoddyKit 课程大约需要 5–10 分钟。每节课都很精短且互动,所以你能稳步进步,并在网页和应用中从离开的地方继续。

我能在这节 AI Engineering Academy 课中编写并运行代码吗?

能。每节 AI Engineering Academy 课都包含内置代码编辑器,你可以在浏览器中直接编写并运行真实代码,并获得即时 AI 反馈 — 无需本地设置。

此课程中的所有课时

  1. 分类智能体故障模式
  2. 自我纠错与反思式提示
  3. 检查点与任务恢复
  4. 人工介入升级
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