Discrete Preference Learning for Personalized Multimodal Generation
Abstract
The emergence of generative models enables the creation of texts and images tailored to users' preferences. Existing personalized generative models have two critical limitations: lacking a dedicated paradigm for accurate preference modeling, and generating unimodal content despite real-world multimodal-driven user interactions. Therefore, we propose personalized multimodal generation, which captures modal-specific preferences via a dedicated preference model from multimodal interactions, and then feeds them into downstream generators for personalized multimodal content. However, this task presents two challenges: (1) Gap between continuous preferences from dedicated modeling and discrete token inputs intrinsic to generator architectures; (2) Potential inconsistency between generated images and texts. To tackle these, we present a two-stage framework called Discrete Preference learning for Personalized Multimodal Generation (DPPMG). In the first stage, to accurately learn discrete modal-specific preferences, we introduce a modal-specific graph neural network (a dedicated preference model) to learn users' modal-specific preferences, which preferences are then quantized into discrete preference tokens. In the second stage, the discrete modal-specific preference tokens are injected into downstream text and image generators. To further enhance cross-modal consistency while preserving personalization, we design a cross-modal consistent and personalized reward to fine-tune token-associated parameters. Extensive experiments on two real-world datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our model in generating personalized and consistent multimodal content.
Assigned reviewers
| # | Reviewer | Match | Why (closest evidence publications in the taxonomy) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zhengyi Yang 0007 | 74 | 60 Generate What You Prefer: Reshaping Sequential Recommendation via Guided Diffusion (2023) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 60 On Efficiency-Effectiveness Trade-off of Diffusion-based Recommenders (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 60 Addressing Missing Data Issue for Diffusion-based Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 2 | Jizhi Zhang | 60 | 63 Learnable Item Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 60 Large Language Models are Learnable Planners for Long-Term Recommendation (2024) Preference Alignment and Optimization 60 TALLRec: An Effective and Efficient Tuning Framework to Align Large Language Model with Recommendation (2023) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 3 | Shijie Wang 0002 | 49 | 62 Towards Next-Generation Recommender Systems: A Benchmark for Personalized Recommendation Assistant with LLMs (2026) Efficiency and Deployment 60 Continuous-time Discrete-space Diffusion Model for Recommendation (2026) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 54 CheatAgent: Attacking LLM-Empowered Recommender Systems via LLM Agent (2024) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
Area chair
| Area chair | Match | |
|---|---|---|
| Maolin Wang 0001 | 46 |
Area-chair candidates (3)
| Maolin Wang 0001 assigned | 46 | 15 papers | |
| Pengyue Jia | 46 | 10 papers | |
| Yanan Niu | 45 | 15 papers |
Candidates from the panel ranked by match score
| # | Reviewer | Match | Load | Why | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zhengyi Yang 0007 assigned | 74 | 3 | 60 Generate What You Prefer: Reshaping Sequential Recommendation via Guided Diffusion (2023) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 60 On Efficiency-Effectiveness Trade-off of Diffusion-based Recommenders (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 2 | Jiancan Wu COI: co-author | 63 | 3 | 60 Larger or Smaller Reward Margins to Select Preferences for LLM Alignment? (2025) Preference Alignment and Optimization 60 Towards Robust Alignment of Language Models: Distributionally Robustifying Direct Preference Optimization (2025) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 3 | Jizhi Zhang assigned | 60 | 3 | 63 Learnable Item Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 60 Large Language Models are Learnable Planners for Long-Term Recommendation (2024) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 4 | Chongming Gao | 59 | 3 | 64 DLCRec: A Novel Approach for Managing Diversity in LLM-Based Recommender Systems (2025) Preference Alignment and Optimization 64 MGFRec: Towards Reinforced Reasoning Recommendation with Multiple Groundings and Feedback (2026) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 5 | Yang Zhang 0072 | 57 | 3 | 62 AlpsBench: An LLM Personalization Benchmark for Real-Dialogue Memorization and Preference Alignment (2026) Efficiency and Deployment 60 Reason4Rec: Deliberative User Preference Alignment of Large Language Models for Recommendation (2026) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 6 | Yupeng Hou | 53 | 3 | 59 ActionPiece: Contextually Tokenizing Action Sequences for Generative Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 57 Multi-Behavior Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 7 | Bowen Zheng 0005 | 53 | 3 | 57 Bridging Textual-Collaborative Gap through Semantic Codes for Sequential Recommendation (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 55 Generative Recommender with End-to-End Learnable Item Tokenization (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 8 | Lantao Hu COI: co-author | 53 | 3 | 72 Distinguished Quantized Guidance for Diffusion-based Sequence Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 60 Fading to Grow: Growing Preference Ratios via Preference Fading Discrete Diffusion for Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 9 | Shuchang Liu 0001 | 51 | 3 | 70 Distinguished Quantized Guidance for Diffusion-based Sequence Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 61 DLCRec: A Novel Approach for Managing Diversity in LLM-Based Recommender Systems (2025) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 10 | Jieming Zhu | 51 | 3 | 58 EAGER: Two-Stream Generative Recommender with Behavior-Semantic Collaboration (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 55 CoST: Contrastive Quantization based Semantic Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 11 | Xuanhua Yang COI: co-author | 50 | 3 | 61 Breaking the Relevance-Diversity Seesaw: Hierarchical LLM Reasoning with RL for Industrial Novelty Recommendation (2026) Preference Alignment and Optimization 57 Towards Personalized Bundle Creative Generation with Contrastive Non-Autoregressive Decoding (2022) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 12 | Han Li 0005 COI: co-author | 49 | 3 | 61 DiffusionGS: Generative Search with Query Conditioned Diffusion in Kuaishou (2026) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 58 Generative Recommender with End-to-End Learnable Item Tokenization (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 13 | Shijie Wang 0002 assigned | 49 | 3 | 62 Towards Next-Generation Recommender Systems: A Benchmark for Personalized Recommendation Assistant with LLMs (2026) Efficiency and Deployment 60 Continuous-time Discrete-space Diffusion Model for Recommendation (2026) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 14 | Ed H. Chi | 49 | 3 | 64 LLMs for User Interest Exploration in Large-scale Recommendation Systems (2024) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization 64 PLUM: Adapting Pre-trained Language Models for Industrial-scale Generative Recommendations (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 15 | Ching Law | 48 | 3 | 61 Reasoning-Grounded Intent Injection for Generative Recommendation (2026) Preference Alignment and Optimization 60 MoFu: Scale-Aware Modulation and Fourier Fusion for Multi-Subject Video Generation (2026) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders |
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| 16 | Junjie Zhang 0009 | 48 | 3 | 65 STARec: An Efficient Agent Framework for Recommender Systems via Autonomous Deliberate Reasoning (2025) RL Training of Search Agents 51 AgentCF: Collaborative Learning with Autonomous Language Agents for Recommender Systems (2024) RL Training of Search Agents |
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| 17 | Jianling Wang | 48 | 3 | 60 LLMs for User Interest Exploration in Large-scale Recommendation Systems (2024) Sequential and Session-based Recommendation 49 Fresh Content Recommendation at Scale: A Multi-funnel Solution and the Potential of LLMs (2024) Efficiency and Deployment |
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| 18 | Qiang Luo 0004 | 48 | 3 | 68 DiffGRM: Diffusion-based Generative Recommendation Model (2026) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 58 OneLoc: Geo-Aware Generative Recommender Systems for Local Life Service (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 19 | Keqin Bao | 47 | 3 | 60 TALLRec: An Effective and Efficient Tuning Framework to Align Large Language Model with Recommendation (2023) Preference Alignment and Optimization 56 Agentic Feedback Loop Modeling Improves Recommendation and User Simulation (2025) User Profile and Persona Modeling |
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| 20 | Huifeng Guo COI: co-author | 47 | 3 | 61 Prompt Tuning as User Inherent Profile Inference Machine (2025) Efficiency and Deployment 54 LLMTreeRec: Unleashing the Power of Large Language Models for Cold-Start Recommendations (2025) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 21 | Hao Deng 0011 | 47 | 3 | 58 REG4Rec: Reasoning-Enhanced Generative Model for Large-Scale Recommendation Systems (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 54 MMQ: Multimodal Mixture-of-Quantization Tokenization for Semantic ID Generation and User Behavioral Adaptation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 22 | Yongqi Li 0001 | 47 | 3 | 58 Learnable Item Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 57 Bridging Items and Language: A Transition Paradigm for Large Language Model-Based Recommendation (2024) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization |
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| 23 | Bo Chen 0023 | 47 | 3 | 50 Full-Stack Optimized Large Language Models for Lifelong Sequential Behavior Comprehension in Recommendation (2026) Sequential and Session-based Recommendation 50 ReLLa: Retrieval-enhanced Large Language Models for Lifelong Sequential Behavior Comprehension in Recommendation (2024) Sequential and Session-based Recommendation |
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| 24 | Xiao Zhang 0034 | 47 | 3 | 68 Similarity = Value? Consultation Value-Assessment and Alignment for Personalized Search (2025) Personalized and Context-Aware Retrieval 60 Large Language Models Enhanced Collaborative Filtering (2024) Preference Alignment and Optimization |
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| 25 | Mengyuan Jing | 47 | 3 | 59 Generating Difficulty-aware Negative Samples via Conditional Diffusion for Multi-modal Recommendation (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 56 Interest-Aware Graph Contrastive Learning for Recommendation With Diffusion-Based Augmentation (2026) Graph Contrastive and Self-Supervised Learning |
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| 26 | Qijiong Liu | 46 | 3 | 55 CoST: Contrastive Quantization based Semantic Tokenization for Generative Recommendation (2024) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs 55 Learning Multi-aspect Item Palette: A Semantic Tokenization Framework for Generative Recommendation (2026) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 27 | Jiuqiang Li 0002 | 46 | 3 | 57 Disentangled Contrastive Bundle Recommendation with Conditional Diffusion (2025) Diffusion and Flow Recommenders 41 Graph Diffusive Self-Supervised Learning for Social Recommendation (2024) Social and Group Recommendation |
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| 28 | Bo Peng 0009 | 46 | 3 | 50 eCeLLM: Generalizing Large Language Models for E-commerce from Large-scale, High-quality Instruction Data (2024) Efficiency and Deployment 49 M2: Mixed Models With Preferences, Popularities and Transitions for Next-Basket Recommendation (2023) Efficient and Long-Sequence Sequential Recommendation |
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| 29 | Lichan Hong | 46 | 3 | 63 PLUM: Adapting Pre-trained Language Models for Industrial-scale Generative Recommendations (2026) Generative Recommendation and Item Tokenization 55 Recommender Systems with Generative Retrieval (2023) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs |
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| 30 | Fei Sun 0001 | 46 | 3 | 47 Intent Preference Decoupling for User Representation on Online Recommender System (2020) Sequential Recommendation with User Modeling and Profiling 46 XDM: Improving Sequential Deep Matching with Unclicked User Behaviors for Recommender System (2022) Sequential Recommendation with User Modeling and Profiling |