First Workshop on AP-XR — Avatar Perception in Extended Reality

Overview

Virtual avatars serve as digital representations of users across the entire Reality–Virtuality Continuum, including Virtual, Augmented, and Mixed Reality (collectively referred to as eXtended Reality, XR). Through perceptual cues—visual, auditory, haptic, proprioceptive/vestibular, and even olfactory—users can perceive avatars as their digital selves, shaping both experience and behavior in XR. While visual perception, as well as visuomotor and visuotactile synchrony, have been studied extensively, far less is known about how cues in other channels, and combinations of cues, affect avatar perception and behavior.

The Avatar Perception in Extended Reality (AP-XR) workshop aims to bring together an international, interdisciplinary community of researchers at all stages of their careers who study how one or multiple perceptual cues impact users’ experiences, perceptions, and behaviors when interacting with avatars across XR contexts. The workshop welcomes both foundational research and practical applications, providing a supportive venue for early-career researchers to present their early work alongside established scholars. No prerequisites are required beyond standard workshop registration.

Topics

We invite submissions that introduce, present, discuss, or evaluate XR systems and studies focused on single- or multisensory avatar perception, as well as application domains where avatar perception plays a critical role. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

Effects of specific cues (visual, auditory, haptic, proprioceptive/vestibular, olfactory) on avatar perception and behavior
Multisensory integration: how cues interact or conflict in shaping embodiment, presence, identification, and agency
Avatar representations across the Reality–Virtuality Continuum (VR/AR/MR): partial bodies, stylized agents, robotic forms, or highly realistic digital twins
Measures and methodologies: objective/subjective, quantitative/qualitative, in-the-wild vs. lab; validity, reliability, and ethics

Submission Guidelines

We accept two types of submissions (page limits include references):

Extended Abstracts (max 2 pages): Presented as posters at the workshop. Not archived in the IEEE Digital Library. Posters already accepted at IEEE VR 2026 may be resubmitted to foster additional discussion.
Short Papers (3–6 pages): Presented as short talks (5–10 minutes) and published in the IEEE Digital Library (IEEE VR Workshops proceedings).

All papers should be original works that are not under review by any other journal or conference. Submissions must be written in English and formatted according to the IEEE Computer Society VGTC (IEEE VR Conference) standards. Templates for LaTeX and Word, as well as a sample PDF, are available at: https://tc.computer.org/vgtc/publications/conference/. Papers should be submitted electronically in PDF format through PCS: https://new.precisionconference.com/.

Submissions must be anonymized to ensure a double-blind review process. Each paper receives a primary review from the organizing committee and at least one external review. To ensure a fair and timely process, we ask at least one senior author per submission to review another manuscript. The organizing committee will hold a final meeting to discuss all reviews and make acceptance decisions. At least one author of each accepted paper is required to register, attend, and present their work at AP-XR.