R0043/2026-04-01/Q002/H2¶
Statement¶
Regulated industries have not addressed the sycophancy phenomenon in their formal requirements, leaving a regulatory gap where agreeable-but-wrong AI output is not covered.
Status¶
Current: Partially Supported
Supporting Evidence¶
| Evidence | Summary |
|---|---|
| SRC06-E01 | No explicit regulatory framework addresses sycophancy; OpenAI's response was voluntary self-regulation |
| SRC02-E01 | NIST AI RMF does not name sycophancy; addresses "confabulation" but this covers factual errors, not agreement-seeking behavior |
Contradicting Evidence¶
| Evidence | Summary |
|---|---|
| SRC01-E01 | EU AI Act does address automation bias, a related concept |
| SRC03-E01 | SR 11-7 effective challenge requirement indirectly addresses the problem |
Reasoning¶
The gap is real but not total. No regulation directly addresses sycophancy-as-model-behavior, but several address adjacent concerns (automation bias, confabulation, model risk). The gap is specifically in the nexus between model behavior and regulatory language.
Relationship to Other Hypotheses¶
H2 overstates the gap — coverage exists but under different terminology. H3 is the more accurate characterization.