THE FIRST WORKSHOP ON USER MODELLING IN CONVERSATIONAL INFORMATION RETRIEVAL(UM-CIR)

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Johanne Trippas

Immersive Personalisation for Conversational Information-seeking:The Future of Interactive Information Retrieval

Abstract: This talk imagines a future where information systems interactions go beyond static interfaces and evolve into dynamic conversations tailored to individual users. Immersive personalisation in conversational information-seeking represents a paradigm shift, redefining how we search, explore, and engage with knowledge. Traditionally, users interact with documents as discrete units of information. However, research in conversational systems has suggested that users rarely think in terms of “documents”. Instead, they focus on fulfilling their information needs, often shaped by specific goals, contexts, and personal preferences. Fuelled by the advances with large language models, immersive personalisation takes this even further, harnessing adaptive interfaces to build systems that intuitively anticipate and adapt to what users want when they want it.

This talk explores a future where conversational systems enable users to navigate and visualise complex, three-dimensional information spaces in real-time, transcending the static “ten blue links” paradigm. Through immersive personalisation, this talk explores how these advancements can revolutionise how we access knowledge, solve problems, and think critically. However, with great potential comes great responsibility. How do we balance personalisation with privacy? How do we ensure fairness while keeping these systems accessible and equitable for all? This vision highlights the power of user-centred design by reimagining the boundaries of what conversational systems can achieve. It is a call to create technology that answers questions and anticipates needs, adapting intuitively to the complexities of human interaction. In this future, engaging with information feels limitless, immersive, and deeply personal—designed for how we think and the world we imagine.

About the Workshop

Conversational Information Retrieval (CIR) has attracted growing research interest in recent years, particularly since the emergence of conversational agents based on generative AI methods. Much of the research activity in CIR within the IR community has generally focused on complex interactive processes between searchers and CIR systems, with little interest in modelling the user within this processes. In this workshop, we aim to collect views and proposals for user modelling with CIR, especially relating to algorithm system design, personalization, and how it might be simulated and evaluated.

The purpose of the workshop is to provide a forum for discussion on the user-centric approaches to conversational information retrieval. The main theme of the workshop is user modelling. The workshop will explore different areas relating to user modelling ranging from personalization, conversation modelling, user simulations and evaluation of CIR systems.

The workshop would be a half-day workshop with keynotes focusing on either in-depth analysis or broad-ranging approaches to conversational information retrieval. It will include an invited keynote speaker and presentations of the accepted papers. We will create break-out discussion groups based on the main research topics/themes that emerge from among the contributions. Following this we will have a discussion panel discussing the presented contributions from an integrated perspective.