Mechanisms, in a Question and Answer (QA) system comprising a processor and a memory are provided for generating an answer to a question. A question is received for which an answer is sought as part of a communication exchange. The question is processed to generate candidate answers and corresponding confidence scores and perform a context based selection of a final answer from the candidate answers. The selected final answer is output as a final answer to the question via a computing device. The context based selection involves determining a context of the input question and selecting a final answer from the one or more candidate answers based on the context of the input question. The selected final answer is an answer previously provided in association with the context of the question.