Call for Position Papers

Submission due: July 25, 2020

IEEE VIS 2020 Workshop on Visualization Psychology (VisPsych)

October 26, 2020, Salt Lack City, Utah, USA


Call for Position Papers

The Workshop on Visualization Psychology (VisPsych) will be held as part of IEEE VIS2020. In its first edition the Workshop will have a very dynamic and innovative format to favour engagement, discussion and interaction among participants. The program will consist of presentations of position papers and panel discussions from the psychology and VIS communities. VisPsych 2020 solicits contributions in the form of Position Papers. Each position paper may address an aspect in relation to one of the following major questions:

  • What advances in cognitive sciences may help us understand how visualization works better?

  • What are VIS research questions that can benefit from more input from researchers in cognitive sciences?

  • What visualization phenomenon is yet to be answered well using theories in psychology, which should be further studied through the lens of visualization?

  • Why may VIS provide a rich playground for making fundamental discoveries in cognitive science?”

  • How can we develop Visualization Psychology as a new subject?

A position paper may offer an insightful observation and critique of the state of the art, present a novel scope for conceptual development, theoretical advancement, empirical investigation, computational modelling, and practical application, and outline a roadmap for future organization of this new subject (e.g., in aspects of conferences, publications, and education). While it is not necessary for these discourses include ideas that have already implemented, they should demonstrate understanding of existing research and provide opportunity for discussions on new research directions. (see also suggested topics below.)

The workshop co-chairs are exploring opportunities for post-workshop publications by inviting authors of accepted position papers to submit full papers to a special issue of a journal or an edited book volume.


Important Dates

  • Papers Submission: July 25, 2020

  • Notification of Acceptance: August 31, 2020

  • Presentation Video: September 24, 2020

  • Camera Ready Copy (arXiv report): September 30, 2020

  • Workshop: October 26, 2020


Formatting Instructions:

  • Submissions shall be in English, maximum 2 pages in length, excluding references, formatted according to the IEEE VIS Poster formatting guidelines

  • Submission will be peer-reviewed by an international program committee to guarantee quality and relevance to the workshop.

  • All accepted papers will be presented during the workshop at VIS2020.

  • All accepted papers will be formally released as arXiv reports and will be listed at the workshop website.

  • At least one author of each accepted paper must register for and attend the workshop to present the paper.


Examples of Topics for Position Papers:

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following examples:

VIS Theories and Psychology

  • Top 10 visualization phenomena that cannot be adequately explained using established theories in perception and cognition.

  • Top 10 visualization guidelines that have not been adequately validated or falsified by the previous empirical studies in VIS and psychology.

Topics in Psychology

  • A research agenda on emotion (or X topic) in visualization and visual analytics.

  • How many research questions in psychology relates to viewing parallel coordinates plots (or Y plots)?

  • Revisit the relative merits of selective attention in visualization.

  • Has the research on biases suggested that visualization is a bad idea?

  • Challenges and opportunities in measuring cognitive load in visualization.

  • How important is to study visualization behaviors using FMRI?

Branches in Psychology

  • Does social psychology have a place in visualization and visual analytics?

  • Let us take visualization and visual analytics back to our ancestors through the lens of evolutionary psychology.

  • Start from young: developmental psychology in visualization and visual analytics.

  • Isms in psychology and Isms in visualization.

Cognition, VA and AI

  • We should not forget the agenda of cognitive research for visual analytics.

  • Are there cognitive theories and experiments that can answer the question why AI can or cannot replace VIS?

  • Can machine learning be used to infer cognitive models for visualization?

  • Human-machine teaming needs new theories and experiments.

Subject Development

  • Lessons learned from theoretical developments in the history of psychology.

  • How a branch of applied psychology is established?

  • One empirical study is not enough for answering a research question.

  • Encouraging evidence-based debates in VIS.

  • Making reproducibility an integral part of Visualization Psychology.

  • A roadmap for future events and publications in Visualization Psychology.

  • What should we teach in a course on Visualization Psychology?