4 papers
Individual-level interventions against sycophantic AI reduce its appeal but not its persuasiveness
Meryl Ye, Robert Kraut, Steve Rathje
AI chatbots can be "sycophantic," or overly agreeable and flattering toward users. Sycophantic AI has been shown to entrench attitudes, yet users frequently fail to recognize it (a…
The Empirically Grounded Adaptive Virtual Patient for Psychotherapy Training: Disclosure That Responds to Therapist Micro-Skills
Angela Chen, Siwei Jin, Catherine Bao +4
Simulated patients offer a scalable way to train psychotherapy micro-skills such as empathic responding and exploratory probing, but current systems either follow fixed scripts or…
What Counts as AI Sycophancy? A Taxonomy and Expert Survey of a Fragmented Construct
Meryl Ye, Lujain Ibrahim, Jessica Y. Bo +5
AI sycophancy has become a prominent concern in large language model (LLM) research. Yet the term lacks a consistent definition and has been applied to behaviors ranging from agree…
The Rise of AI Companions: Interaction with AI Companions and Psychological Well-being
Yutong Zhang, Dora Zhao, Jeffrey T. Hancock +2
As large language model (LLM)-enhanced chatbots become increasingly expressive and socially responsive, many users begin forming companionship-like bonds with them. This study inve…