Diversity as a Response to User Preference Uncertainty

Edwards, James Anthony and Leslie, David Stuart (2018) Diversity as a Response to User Preference Uncertainty. In: Statistical Data Science :. World Scientific, pp. 55-68. ISBN 9781786345394

Abstract

This chapter considers the problem of choosing a set of website elements to present to a user. An often desirable property of such a set is that it is diverse, i.e. the elements are not all similar to one another. Often this is presented as being a separate objective from that of choosing elements that match the user in some way and which are therefore more likely to be clicked. We present a range of simple and intuitive models based on uncertainty about user preferences that show how diversity emerges naturally as a result of seeking to maximise the probability that the user will click on an element. As such we give an argument as to why diversity is desirable which avoids the need for it as a separate objective. The exact model used affects the diversity of sets chosen as well as the likelihood that the user will click on an element.