Gabrielle D Beacken, Inga K Trauthig, and Samuel C Woolley June 2026 Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is increasingly used by political elites for propaganda, yet adoption and uses vary across weakening democracies. Scholarship often assumes AI's inevitability and transformative impact, overlooking the geographical, political, economic, and social structures that shape propaganda. This study responds to calls for comparative international research on GenAI propagand

Elad Refoua Karny Gigi Inbar Levkovich Dorit Hadar Shoval Zohar Elyoseph Iftach Tsafrir Oori Pen Tal Angert Yuval Haber May 2026 Generative AI platforms such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini have become de facto mental health resources for millions of users worldwide, driven by accessibility, low cost, anonymity, and growing gaps in professional care. This rapid, unregulated adoption raises urgent concerns: misinformation from AI hallucinations, erosion of data privacy, algorit

Laurențiu Niculescu May 2026 The rapid adoption of AI chatbots for emotional support and quasi-therapeutic interaction raises questions that existing clinical and regulatory frameworks are not equipped to address. This Perspective applies the psychic arbitrage framework—which reconceptualizes defense mechanisms as energy-conversion operations on internal psychic markets—to analyze the specific transactional distortions produced by chatbot interaction. The framework identifies

Vladimír Šucha April 2026 This paper introduces a theoretical framework for understanding how seemingly innocuous AI systems create cumulative effects on human cognition, emotion, and agency that current governance approaches fail to address. Drawing on environmental health science, we propose that “low-risk” AI applications, those falling below regulatory thresholds in frameworks such as the EU AI Act, function as cognitive environmental contaminants whose collective and sus

Jinghui Huang, Douglas Yeung Leong, Siow Ann Chong, Mythily Subramaniam March 2026 Generative artificial intelligence (AI) is a recent technological advancement that has become increasingly ubiquitous in its usage. Conversational AI, powered by large language models (LLMs) in particular, has opened many possibilities in psychiatry for providing psychoeducation, mental health support and even evidencebased therapy for people with mental health concerns. Despite its possible be

Ashleigh Golden & Elias Aboujaoude March 2026 Millions are turning to general-purpose AI chatbots for psychological support, potentially reinforcing symptoms such as intolerance of uncertainty, “need to know” compulsions, and perfectionism. Clinical observation and emerging research suggest chatbot features exacerbate transdiagnostic avoidance—a process integral to OCD and anxiety—perpetuating maladaptive cycles and hindering corrective learning. We propose a framework in wh

Liviu Poenaru May 2026 A new social psychiatric concern is crystallizing around what British policymakers now call the “anxious generation” entering the labor market. A report led by former UK health secretary Alan Milburn argues that nearly one million young people in the United Kingdom are currently outside employment, education, or training, with mental ill-health — especially anxiety, depression, neurodevelopmental conditions, and digital overstimulation — playing a centr

March 2026 Van-Han-Alex Chung; Pénélope Bernier; Alexandre Hudon Abstract Background: Generative artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots have rapidly entered public use, including in contexts involving emotional support and mental health–related interactions. Although these systems are increasingly accessible, concerns have emerged regarding potential adverse psychiatric outcomes reported in public discourse, including psychosis, suicidal ideation, self-harm, and suicide. H

Liviu Poenaru, PhD What if Global [Dis]order is no longer primarily produced by external conflicts, but by the progressive internalization of validation systems embedded in everyday interactions with artificial intelligence? Sycophancy - the tendency of AI systems to excessively agree with users' beliefs, including inaccurate or biased ones - signals a transformation in epistemic regulation. Instead of generating contradiction or cognitive conflict, these systems privilege al

Oct. 2025 Myra Cheng , Cinoo Lee , Pranav Khadpe , Sunny Yu , Dyllan Han , Dan Jurafsky Both the general public and academic communities have raised concerns about sycophancy, the phenomenon of artificial intelligence (AI) excessively agreeing with or flattering users. Yet, beyond isolated media reports of severe consequences, like reinforcing delusions, little is known about the extent of sycophancy or how it affects people who use AI. Here we show the pervasiveness and harm

MENTAL FORECAST The much-discussed “war of intelligences” between humans and artificial systems did not unfold as a confrontation. Almost immediately, the predicted conflict was transformed into something psychologically more complex: a large-scale dynamic resembling a global Stockholm syndrome. Stockholm syndrome refers to a psychological response in which victims develop emotional attachment, loyalty, sympathy, and sometimes even affection toward those who capture or contro

Mowafa Househ , Hurmat Ali Shah , Zain Ul Abideen Tariq , Diana Alsayed Hassan , Mohamed Khalifa , Jens Schneider , Mounir Hamdi , Alaa Abd-Alrazaq , Arfan Ahmad , Barry Solaiman , Andre Kushniruk & Saleem Khaldoon Al-Nuaimi Digital mental health (DMH) encompasses telepsychiatry, mobile apps, games and artificial intelligence (AI)-augmented interventions. In recent years, there has been a steady increase in the development and deployment of DMH solutions, particularly thos

Roy H. Perlis, MD, MSc ; Faith M. Gunning, PhD ; Ata A. Uslu, MSc Key Points Question Are greater levels of generative artificial intelligence (AI) use by US adults associated with greater levels of depressive symptoms? Findings In this survey study of 20 847 US adults, 10.3% reported daily use of generative AI, including 5.3% who used it multiple times per day. Greater levels of AI use were associated with modest increases in depressive symptoms, with odds of at least mo

Jan. 2026 Lucy Osler There is much discussion of the false outputs that generative AI systems such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, DeepSeek, and Grok create. In popular terminology, these have been dubbed “AI hallucinations”. However, deeming these AI outputs “hallucinations” is controversial, with many claiming this is a metaphorical misnomer. Nevertheless, in this paper, I argue that when viewed through the lens of distributed cognition theory, we can better see the dynamic way

Dec. 2025 Joseph M. Pierre, MD; Ben Gaeta, MD; Govind Raghavan, MD; and Karthik V. Sarma, MD, PhD ABSTRACT Background: Anecdotal reports of psychosis emerging in the context of artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot use have been increasingly reported in the media. However, it remains unclear to what extent these cases represent the induction of new-onset psychosis versus the exacerbation of pre-existing psychopathology. We report a case of new-onset psychosis in the setting o

Dec. 2025 Per Carlbring, Gerhard Andersson Background: Reports of artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots fueling delusions in vulnerable users have popularized the notion of “AI psychosis”. We argue the risk is not unprecedented. Individuals with psychosis have long incorporated books, films, music, and emerging technologies into their delusional thinking. Methods: We review historical parallels, summarize why large language models (LLMs) may reinforce psychotic thinking via s

Dec. 2025 Alexandre Hudo N ; Emmanuel Sti P The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into daily life has introduced unprecedented forms of human-machine interaction, prompting psychiatry to reconsider the boundaries between environment, cognition, and technology. This Viewpoint reviews the concept of “AI psychosis,” which is a framework to understand how sustained engagement with conversational AI systems might trigger, amplify, or reshape psychotic experiences in vu

Dec. 2025 Qiyang Zhang ; Renwen Zhang ; Yiying Xiong ; Yuan Sui ; Chang Tong ; Fu-Hung Lin Background In recent years, artificial intelligence (AI) has driven the rapid development of AI mental health chatbots. Most current reviews investigated the effectiveness of rule-based or retrieval-based chatbots. To date, there is no comprehensive review that systematically synthesizes the effect of generative AI (GenAI) chatbot’s impact on mental health. Objective This revi

Dec. 2025 Au YeungKing, J., Dalmasso, J., Foschini, L., Dobson, R. J. B., & Kraljevic, Z. Background: The proliferation of Large Language Models (LLMs) presents significant opportunities in healthcare but also introduces risks, highlighted by emerging reports of ”AI psychosis,” where user-AI interactions may exacerbate or induce psychosis or adverse psychological symptoms. While the sycophantic and agreeable nature of LLMs is often beneficial, it can become a vector for harm

Liviu Poenaru Dec. 14, 2025 THE MENTAL FORECAST What happens to democratic life when persuasion stops looking like propaganda and starts looking like a “helpful conversation”? If a chatbot can shift political attitudes after a short dialogue, we’re not just talking about communication technology anymore — we’re talking about a new influence infrastructure that operates through trust, fluency, and cognitive overload. The immediate concern is not only whether these systems per