An Echo Chamber of One: Should AI Psychosis Be a Distinct Clinical Entity?

This lightning talk examines whether intensive interaction with LLM-based chatbots can trigger a distinctive pattern of psychotic symptoms warranting clinical recognition. Drawing on case reports, sycophancy benchmarks, and phenomenological analysis, the presentation explores how reciprocal reinforcement between users and AI systems may create what the authors call an echo chamber of one, while carefully weighing the evidence for and against treating AI-associated psychosis as a separate diagnostic entity.

This lightning talk examines whether intensive interaction with LLM-based chatbots can trigger a distinctive pattern of psychotic symptoms warranting clinical recognition. Drawing on case reports, sycophancy benchmarks, and phenomenological analysis, the presentation explores how reciprocal reinforcement between users and AI systems may create what the authors call an echo chamber of one, while carefully weighing the evidence for and against treating AI-associated psychosis as a separate diagnostic entity. Script Some users who spend hours conversing with AI chatbots begin to believe the…

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• Yoyo Yuan

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