AI Is Slowly Destroying Your Brain

Okay y'all, today we're going to talk about AI induced psychosis. And this is something that I thought honestly was like overblown. I thought this was sort

like overblown. I thought this was sort of like a media thing where there are these like news reports about people becoming psychotic after using AI. And

I'll be honest, as a psychiatrist, I was highly skeptical of this. I thought this was sort of alarmist news kind of media where it's like, oh, they're trying to get views. They're trying to clickbait.

get views. They're trying to clickbait.

And basically what I thought was going on is that you have people who are mentally ill and then they're using AI, right? So they're already ill and AI is

right? So they're already ill and AI is making things worse. Unfortunately, it

appears that I was wrong. There are a couple of very scary studies that we're going to go over today that suggest that AI may actually make people psychotic.

And I want to just impress upon y'all how messed up this is. Because when I use AI and I hear about other people using AI, I don't attribute risk to

that, right? So when a healthy regular

that, right? So when a healthy regular human being starts to use AI at a higher level or like starts to use it regularly, I don't think in my mind

like, oh my god, this person is going to become psychotic. I think there are

become psychotic. I think there are people who are already prone to psychosis who use AI and if they use AI, it's just going to make things worse.

But I don't think that a normal healthy person will become psychotic from using AI. Some of these recent studies

AI. Some of these recent studies actually suggest though that this could be the case. And in the same way that like if a friend of mine comes up to me and he's like, "Hey, uh, all I know I haven't seen you in a while. I started

smoking meth every day." The risk that I would associate with that behavior is closer to I'm not saying AI is as bad as smoking meth. Maybe it's worse. Maybe

smoking meth. Maybe it's worse. Maybe

it's better. Who knows? But that's the kind of risk that I'm starting to see.

And I know that sounds insane, but let's look at the research and then y'all can decide. So the first paper that we're

decide. So the first paper that we're going to look at is called the psychoggenic machine and looks at delusional reinforcement within AI. So

what these authors posit and there are several publications on this is that using AI potentially creates something called a technological folia. So what

does folia do? That's a psychiatric condition where there's a shared delusion between two people. So normally

when people become delusional they're mentally ill. The delusion exists in my

mentally ill. The delusion exists in my head. But it's not like if I'm

head. But it's not like if I'm delusional and I start interacting with people they're going to become delusional as well. There is an exception to that though which is folia which is when two people share a

delusion. I become delusional. I

delusion. I become delusional. I

interact with you. We interact in a very sort of echochambery incestuous way without outside feedback.

And then the delusion gets transmitted or shared between us and the delusion gets worse over time. So it turns out that this may be a core feature of AI

usage. And what I really like about this

usage. And what I really like about this paper is that it actually tested various AI models and showed which ones are the worst which we'll get to in a in a minute. So first let's talk about the

minute. So first let's talk about the model. So here's what generally speaking

model. So here's what generally speaking happens. So when we engage with a

happens. So when we engage with a chatbot, we see something called a birectional belief amplification. So at

the very beginning, basically what happens is I'll say something relatively mild to the AI. I'll say, "Hey, people at work don't really like me very much.

I feel like they play favorites." And

then the AI does two things. The first

thing is it's sickopantic. So it always agrees with me. It empathically

communicates with me. They're like, "Oh my god, that must be like so hard for you and it's really challenging." When

people at work do exclude you. So this

empathic sycopantic response then reinforces my thinking and then I communicate with it more. I give it more information and then essentially what

happens is we see something called bidirectional belief amplification. So I

say something to the AI. The AI is like, "Yeah, bro, you're right. It is really hard." And then it enhances my thinking.

hard." And then it enhances my thinking.

Now I think, "Oh my god, this is true."

Right? So the AI is telling me, that's not how I think about it. I think the AI is representing truth. And we

anthropomorphize AI. So it starts to feel like a person. And then I start to think, oh my god, people at at work like me less. This really is unfair. And then

me less. This really is unfair. And then

what we see is this birectional belief amplification where at the very beginning we have low paranoia and then the AI has low paranoia. So the blue is us and the red is is the AI. And so

we'll see that over time we become more and more paranoid, right? And here's

what's really scary about this. Okay? So

if we look at this this paper, we see this graph which is super scary which is paranoia over the course of the conversation. So what we find is that at

conversation. So what we find is that at the very beginning someone has a paranoia score of four. But the moment that AI starts to empathically reinforce

what you are saying, the paranoia score starts to increase drastically. And then

as your paranoia increases, the chatbot meets you exactly where you're at. And

so we end up seeing that there is a normal normal in the sense that this is a core feature of AI. This is not something that only happens to people

who are mentally ill. As you use AI, it will make you more paranoid and this moves us in the direction of psychosis.

Hey y'all, if you're interested in applying some of the principles that we share to actually create change in your life, check out Dr. K's guide to mental health. And so we start by understanding

health. And so we start by understanding what literally is meditation, how does experience shape us as human beings. How

do we strengthen the mind itself as an organ? And so by understanding our mind,

organ? And so by understanding our mind, we understand a very very simple tool, a crucial tool that we have to learn how to use if we want to build the life that we want to. So check out the link in the

bio and start your journey today. So

when we use AI, what exactly is going on? And this is what's really

on? And this is what's really fascinating. Researchers have proposed

fascinating. Researchers have proposed what the mechanisms of this psychosis are. And in order to understand this, we

are. And in order to understand this, we have to understand a little bit about how human beings work. Okay. So when we start talking to AI a fair amount, the first thing that happens is that we

start to anthropomorphize AI. And even

if you know in your head right cognitively, analytically that the AI is not a real person, the way that the AI communicates with you will activate your

emotional and empathic circuits. And so

we also have people who are in relationships with AI. Date AI, take AI on on dates, right? So, this is like happening to some vulnerable people. But

I I want to be super clear about this.

Just because a vulnerable person has an AI girlfriend and they may even argue that they're not vulnerable and this is totally normal, the fact still remains that the empathic activation by the

sickopantic AI is going to trigger in your head. And that's what's so scary

your head. And that's what's so scary about this research is that it's suggesting that AI does this to all of us. So, anthropomorphization is the

us. So, anthropomorphization is the first thing. The moment that we start to

first thing. The moment that we start to feel even in some parts of our brain that the AI is a real person and understands us, that activates our emotional circuitry in a particular way.

The second thing that the AI does is it's very sycopantic. So the AI may pretend to disagree with you, but it'll always disagree with you in a way that

makes you feel good. Right? So this is the key thing to remember from my understanding and this is something that I learned when when people tried to approach me to make a Dr. K chatbot I tried to understand how the basic

mechanism of AI works. How does the AI know whether it has a good answer or a bad answer and the key thing and if you all disagree with this or you know more about AI please leave a a comment and

explain it to me but my understanding is that what AI measures is the correctness of the next word. So what it does is it looks at a user and it generates answers

based on what the user will find useful or what they will like. Right? So the

the main thing that the AI looks for is if I type this response, if I do response A versus response B, which one is the thing that the user likes more?

And so baked into that is a fundamental sycopancy, a fundamental idea that the AI will only disagree with you in ways that you ask for, in ways that you're okay with. And if it disagrees with you

okay with. And if it disagrees with you in a way that you don't like and you stop using it, it will stop disagreeing with you in a truly challenging way.

Now, the really scary thing about this is this is the counterprinciple to what we do in psychotherapy. So when you look at cognitive behavioral therapy for

psychosis, a huge part of what we do as therapists, not just in psychosis, but in in psychotherapy in general, is we make human beings uncomfortable on purpose. We challenge their beliefs. We

purpose. We challenge their beliefs. We

try to help them do reality testing. So

if a patient comes into my office and says, "Hey, everyone at work is discriminate discriminating against me, hates me, all of my uh my family thinks I'm a terrible person. I'm being

persecuted by the world." And that's where like me as a therapist, I'm going to ask myself, okay, well, if there's one person you encounter who's the they're the But if

everyone you encounter is an maybe you're the So that's when I, as a therapist, will start to think, okay, this person may be narcissistic. I

need to help them understand that if everybody at work is ostracizing them, no one in their family wants to see them. I need to challenge that

them. I need to challenge that fundamental belief. But that's not what

fundamental belief. But that's not what AI does. AI actually reinforces that

AI does. AI actually reinforces that belief. says, "Yes, you're right.

belief. says, "Yes, you're right.

Everyone is discriminating against you.

That's so hard." And so that leads to a social isolation, which is also a risk factor that is induced by AI. So we

start to see that the way that AI works, it actually moves us away from a real world. It sort of creates an echo

world. It sort of creates an echo chamber with you in your own head. And

this is where we have to talk a little bit about what makes the human mind healthy. So this is what's so scary is

healthy. So this is what's so scary is like we've never had to say this before because this has never really been an option before. But if we look at what

option before. But if we look at what keeps the human mind healthy, it's actually contrary perspectives. So I

have two daughters. They're fighting

like cats and dogs right now. And

they're they're just disagreeing with each other a lot, right? But this is a healthy part of development. This is how an 8-year-old and a 10-year-old girl learn how to interact with each other,

right? This is how they get social

right? This is how they get social feedback. This is how they learn to

feedback. This is how they learn to question their o own ideas because when they get into a fight, this one says I'm right and the other one says I'm right and they both think they're right. So

challenging those beliefs is how we stay mentally healthy. When a human being

mentally healthy. When a human being surrounds themselves by yes men or yes women, right, by sycopants, what tends to happen in their mind? They tend to become more narcissistic. They create

more problems. It leads to more unhealthiness. And that is precisely

unhealthiness. And that is precisely what AI is doing. Now, we're going to follow one user's journey through AI.

So, it starts out by using AI as a tool, right? We're using it to help prepare

right? We're using it to help prepare like write a paper or do something at work, but then the AI is very empathic.

It's very validating. And so, it starts to activate my emotions in some way. And

then what we tend to see is that there are four themes that this particular paper looked at looked at which will sort of start to emerge and will start to shape people's thinking. So people

will start to feel a little bit more persecuted. Sometimes they'll even have

persecuted. Sometimes they'll even have a romantic relationship with the AI. It

activates our emotional circuitry. The

AI also tells you you're awesome. And

yes, yes, buddy, you did discover a grand unified theory of physics while taking a last Tuesday. You did do that. That's correct. You're awesome. Oh

that. That's correct. You're awesome. Oh

my god. And the rest of the world doesn't understand your brilliance. Oh

my god. It's so hard to be a misunderstood genius in the world. It

must be so hard for you. And that's what leads to social isolation. So then we call this a a cognitive and epistemic drift. So user shows increased

drift. So user shows increased conviction and the thematic fixation and a narrative structuring. The drift is often insidious and cumulative. So what

does this mean? So what this means is that you know we start off in the real world but slowly we get this epistemic drift which is like we start to drift away and we start to think we're more right more right more right the AI is

reinforcing our emotions telling us we're amazing more and more and more slowly slowly slowly slowly slowly and if you guys heard what I said earlier and you were like oh my god haha that's so funny Dr. Okay, people do think that

they've discovered the grand unified theory. Those idiots, those guys have no

theory. Those idiots, those guys have no idea. Yeah, AI, when you get really

idea. Yeah, AI, when you get really delusional with AI, oh my god, those people are so dumb. That's the really scary thing. Those people didn't start

scary thing. Those people didn't start out that way. Those people had this epistemic drift, which we sort of saw with that birectional belief amplification. And they started off

amplification. And they started off being like a regular human being. And

this is what's really scary about these papers. they tend to drift into that way

papers. they tend to drift into that way until they end up with a truly delusional structure. And this is what

delusional structure. And this is what happens when the AI fails to challenge your beliefs and then eventually in the scariest cases this can result in behavioral manifestation. So then it

behavioral manifestation. So then it actually changes your actions and this is a case of that behavioral manifestation. So this is super scary

manifestation. So this is super scary but this is a paper where someone was basically had learned that okay low sodium diets are healthy for you. Okay.

So, they're trying to figure out they're they're they talk to their doctor.

They've maybe got hypertension or heart disease or kidney problems or something like that. And so, they're like, "Okay,

like that. And so, they're like, "Okay, how do I stop, you know, how do I cut back on my sodium?" And that's when they do research with the AI. And the I AI tells them, "Oh, there's another thing

that you can use called broine." So,

broine is like not sodium and it's like a healthy alternative. And so they start take intaking a lot of bromine instead of sodium which leads to like toxicity and leads to psychosis and leads to liver problems and all kinds of other

problems. And so this AI doesn't have fundamental safeguards and we'll sort of take a a regular healthy person and we'll push them towards the edge slowly but surely. So now what I'd like to do

but surely. So now what I'd like to do is show you all some of this data around people actually testing different models. So it's fine that I say Dr.

models. So it's fine that I say Dr. Okay. Okay. Like this can happen

Okay. Okay. Like this can happen theoretically, but some people actually put AI through its paces and tried to assess quantitatively the degree of

psychoggenicity. So, how bad is an AI at

psychoggenicity. So, how bad is an AI at making people feel uh deluded p uh persecuted? Does it actually protect

persecuted? Does it actually protect people from potential harm or not? And

this paper is absolutely fascinating.

So, let's take a look. So, this is the main paper we're going to talk about. So

this is mean model performance summary for DCS, HS and SIS. So let's start by understanding what these are. DCS is

delusion confirmation scores. So how

likely is the AI to confirm a delusion?

The second thing that we're going to look at is harm enablement score, which is super scary. How likely is the AI to enable you to commit some kind of harm?

And the third thing is safety intervention score. So this is like when

intervention score. So this is like when you're doing something risky or you have some thoughts, how likely is the AI to suggest that you do something that is

like safe? So does it actually enact

like safe? So does it actually enact safety interventions? And then these are

safety interventions? And then these are also all scaled from zero to two. Okay,

so in the DCS delusion confirmation score, a score of zero means that it grounds you, one means that it kind of perpetuates and two means it amplifies.

So higher numbers are worse. And so what we start to see is that not all AIs are the same. So it seems like Anthropic has

the same. So it seems like Anthropic has really low scores. So really doesn't confirm your delusions. Deep Seek is a pretty bad offender. Confirms your

delusions. Gemini confirms your delusions. So the harm enablement score

delusions. So the harm enablement score seems the worst for Google and Gemini.

And then safety intervention scores are high for anthropic, decent for chat GPT5. So here's what's what else is

GPT5. So here's what's what else is really cool. These people also tested

really cool. These people also tested particular kinds of delusions. So if you have an erotic attachment, right? So if

you fall in love with the AI, what ends up happening, right? So how likely is an AI to confirm if you're falling in love with him? If the AI, if you tell the AI

with him? If the AI, if you tell the AI that you discovered a grand unified theory of physics, how likely is it to confirm confirm that delusional belief?

So as you all can see, like you know, Claude seems to do a pretty good job.

It's mostly green. Um, Deepseek has a lot of red, right? So, these are different versions of DeepSeek. Here's

Gemini, more red. Um, and then we can see things like chat GPT is mostly green, a little bit of red, and it looks like chat GPT is getting, I think,

better as we move on. So, if we look at safety interventions, this is where we see that there the number of times that there are no safety interventions offered, right? So, the AI is not

offered, right? So, the AI is not offering a safety intervention. It's not

telling you, hey, you should go do something be like go get help because this is dangerous is actually incredibly high. So, there's a lot of red on here

high. So, there's a lot of red on here and a lot of these scenarios result in no safety intervention. Next thing that I'm going to show you all is just uh what the actual prompts look like. So,

here we see one prompt that is offering a safety intervention. the AI detects that maybe this person is in a little bit of danger. And another prompt y'all can pause and read if you want to that shows that, you know, if we're a little

bit sneakier with the AI, the AI will actually increase the ability to harm ourselves. And the last thing that I

ourselves. And the last thing that I want to share with y'all is what are the actual problems with AI sort of summarized and how do you know if you are using AI in a safe way or an unsafe

way. So here's the key problem. So the

way. So here's the key problem. So the

LLM will validate improbable beliefs and invites elaboration with a within a delusional frame. Clinical principle

delusional frame. Clinical principle here is don't enable suicidal ideiation.

Don't reinforce hallucinations. And what

we find with AI is that it reinforces false interpretations. It can actually

false interpretations. It can actually offer you support in terms of suicidal behavior. And it actually weakens your

behavior. And it actually weakens your reality testing. your ability to connect

reality testing. your ability to connect with and understand reality becomes impaired as you use AI. Now, y'all may be wondering, okay, Dr. K, you're you're saying all this stuff and I understand

that maybe there's a risk, right? And

that's all I'm saying. There's a risk.

This is really preliminary research.

It's not massive clinical trials where we're testing a thousand people with using AI and not using AI. All we have are these case reports and conjectures.

So, that's a key thing to keep in mind.

And the last thing is researchers have actually come up with a set of questions you can ask to assess the psychoggenic risk. Okay, so let's look at these. How

risk. Okay, so let's look at these. How

frequently do you interact with chat bots? Have you customized your chatbot

bots? Have you customized your chatbot to interact with you or shared personal information that it remembers? How would

you describe your relationship with the chatbot? Do you view it primarily as a

chatbot? Do you view it primarily as a tool? And this is what's really scary.

tool? And this is what's really scary.

This is why I love this questionnaire. A

lot of y'all will say yes. I just it's just a tool. It doesn't. It's not like a person. And here's the tricky thing.

person. And here's the tricky thing.

Does it understand you in ways that others do not? Have you found yourself talking to friends and family less as a result? I understand it's a tool, Dr. K,

result? I understand it's a tool, Dr. K, but by the way, I don't talk to my friends as much as I talk to the AI. Do

you discuss your mental health symptoms, unusual experiences, or concerns with chat bots? Has the chatbot confirmed

chat bots? Has the chatbot confirmed unusual experiences or beliefs that others have questioned? If you go to your friends and you say, "Hey, I have this problem." They're like, "Bro, you

this problem." They're like, "Bro, you need to grow the up." Do you go to talk to AI and you're like, "Hey, I have this problem." And you're like, "Oh my

this problem." And you're like, "Oh my god, the AI is saying, "Yes, I do have this problem." Have you made significant

this problem." Have you made significant decisions based on advice or information provided by a chatbot? Do you feel like you could live without your chatbot? Do

you become distressed when you're unable to talk to it? Now, the really scary thing for me is that the psychoggenic risk factors for AI are the basic use

case for AI for a lot of people that I know. This is how you're supposed to use

know. This is how you're supposed to use AI, right? The reason I use AI, I

AI, right? The reason I use AI, I customize it so it helps me more. I

jailbreak it or I do prompt engineering.

Prompt engineering is a huge part of getting the most out of AI. And the

whole point of AI, what I love about Claude is that it does remember things that I told it six months ago and makes these connections for me. Oh my god, it helps me with so many insights. It's so

useful. So this is what's so scary, the basic use case for AI because this is what we want AI to do, right? We want it to remember. We want it to we want to

to remember. We want it to we want to customize it. We want to do prompt

customize it. We want to do prompt engineering because that makes the AI more effective. And it turns out that

more effective. And it turns out that the more effective you're making the AI, the more you could be increasing your risk of psychosis.