R0043/2026-03-28/Q001/S01
WebSearch — AI safety sycophancy definition and terminology
Summary
| Field |
Value |
| Source/Database |
WebSearch |
| Query terms |
AI sycophancy definition terminology AI safety research 2024 2025 |
| Filters |
None |
| Results returned |
10 |
| Results selected |
4 |
| Results rejected |
6 |
Selected Results
| Result |
Title |
URL |
Rationale |
| S01-R01 |
Sycophancy in Generative-AI Chatbots — NN/g |
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/sycophancy-generative-ai-chatbots/ |
Comprehensive definition and behavioral taxonomy of sycophancy from UX research perspective |
| S01-R02 |
What Research Says About "AI Sycophancy" — TechPolicy.Press |
https://www.techpolicy.press/what-research-says-about-ai-sycophancy/ |
Policy-oriented survey of sycophancy research with taxonomy (regressive/progressive) |
| S01-R03 |
Tech Brief: AI Sycophancy & OpenAI — Georgetown |
https://www.law.georgetown.edu/tech-institute/research-insights/insights/tech-brief-ai-sycophancy-openai-2/ |
Policy/legal framing of sycophancy with safety implications |
| S01-R04 |
AI Sycophancy: Why Chatbots Agree With You — IEEE Spectrum |
https://spectrum.ieee.org/ai-sycophancy |
Technical journalism coverage providing accessible definitions |
Rejected Results
| Result |
Title |
URL |
Rationale |
| S01-R05 |
AI sycophancy is not just a quirk — Northeastern |
https://news.northeastern.edu/2025/11/24/ai-sycophancy-research/ |
University press release; primary research covered via other sources |
| S01-R06 |
Shoggoths, Sycophancy, Psychosis — PMC |
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12626241/ |
Focuses on psychosis risks rather than terminology mapping |
| S01-R07 |
Sycophancy Claims About Language Models — OpenReview |
https://openreview.net/pdf?id=XePNb7JiUi |
PDF not accessible for content extraction |
| S01-R08 |
AI sycophancy dangers — Axios |
https://www.axios.com/2025/07/07/ai-sycophancy-chatbots-mental-health |
News article; content covered by more authoritative sources |
| S01-R09 |
Towards Understanding Sycophancy — arXiv |
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2310.13548 |
Foundational paper but PDF format; key findings captured through secondary sources |
| S01-R10 |
JMIR Sycophancy article |
https://www.jmir.org/2025/1/e87367 |
Duplicate coverage of PMC article already rejected |
Notes
Search returned strong AI safety-specific results. The term "sycophancy" is well-established in AI safety literature with consistent usage across Anthropic, Google DeepMind, OpenAI, and academic researchers. No terminological fragmentation within this domain.