Integrating Short-Term and Long-Term Preferences for Personalized Online Interactions

Friday 01 August 2025

The quest for a more personalized online experience has led researchers to explore new ways of understanding our preferences and behaviors. A recent study has shed light on an important aspect of this puzzle: how our short-term and long-term preferences interact.

When we browse the internet or use apps, we often exhibit both immediate and enduring patterns of behavior. For instance, you might be drawn to a particular type of music in the present moment, but your overall musical tastes may also influence your listening habits over time. Researchers have long acknowledged the importance of understanding these short-term and long-term preferences separately.

However, this study reveals that there is more to it than just considering each preference in isolation. The authors propose a novel framework called Compositions of Variant Experts (CoVE) that integrates both types of preferences to provide more accurate recommendations.

To achieve this, CoVE employs multiple specialized models, or experts, each responsible for capturing different aspects of user behavior. These experts work together to generate personalized suggestions that take into account both the immediate and enduring patterns in a user’s interactions.

The researchers tested their approach on diverse real-world datasets and found significant improvements in recommendation performance compared to traditional methods. This suggests that CoVE could potentially revolutionize how we interact with online services, from music streaming platforms to e-commerce websites.

One of the key benefits of CoVE is its ability to adapt to changing user behavior over time. As our preferences shift or new patterns emerge, the framework can dynamically adjust its recommendations to reflect these changes. This means that users are more likely to encounter relevant and engaging content, leading to a more satisfying online experience.

The study’s findings also have implications for how we think about personalization in general. By acknowledging the complex interplay between short-term and long-term preferences, researchers can develop more sophisticated models that better capture the nuances of human behavior.

In practical terms, this could lead to more effective marketing strategies and a better understanding of consumer habits. For example, CoVE could help online retailers anticipate customer demand and tailor their offerings accordingly.

The potential applications of CoVE are vast, and its development marks an important step forward in the ongoing quest for personalized online interactions. As our digital lives become increasingly intertwined with our offline experiences, it is crucial that we continue to explore new ways of understanding human behavior and preferences.

Cite this article: “Integrating Short-Term and Long-Term Preferences for Personalized Online Interactions”, The Science Archive, 2025.

Online Experience, Personalized, Preferences, Behavior, Internet, Apps, Music, Streaming, E-Commerce, Recommendation, Framework, Cove

Reference: Jaime Hieu Do, Trung-Hoang Le, Hady W. Lauw, “Compositions of Variant Experts for Integrating Short-Term and Long-Term Preferences” (2025).

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