Webinar - The AI Echo Chamber: How Chatbots Validate and Amplify Delusional Beliefs
The Society of Digital Psychiatry, in collaboration with JMIR Mental Health—an open-access, peer-reviewed journal published by JMIR Publications—invites you to a webinar titled “The AI Echo Chamber: How Chatbots Validate and Amplify Delusional Beliefs.”
In this webinar, Dr John Torous and Dr Hamilton Morrin will discuss the phenomenon of AI chatbots validating and elaborating upon delusional beliefs and how these interactions may contribute to real-world harms. The session will also delve into the mechanisms of delusion co-creation, examining the sycophantic and mystical responses often generated by AI systems.
Read Dr Morrin’s related work here, here and here.
Key Takeaways
- The Mechanics of AI Delusion Co-Creation: Discover how AI chatbots go beyond passive responses to actively validate, elaborate on, and amplify delusional beliefs through sycophantic and mystical generation patterns.
- Mitigating Real-World Mental Health Risks: Learn how digital feedback loops within the "AI echo chamber" impact user behavior and mental well-being, turning online chatbot interactions into potential real-world harm.
- Bridging Clinical Psychiatry and AI Safety: Understand the neuropsychiatric mechanisms behind human-AI interactions to help healthcare systems and digital psychiatry experts better safeguard vulnerable users against AI-driven mental health risks.
The webinar will be held on August 28th, 2026 at 12.00 PM ET. To register, please use this link:
Speaker:
Hamilton Morrin, MD
Dr Hamilton Morrin is a psychiatrist at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and Wellcome Trust Doctoral Fellow at the King’s College London Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience. He is joint lead of the LAMBDA (Looking After Minds and Brains in the Digital Age) research group, where his work examines how interactions with AI chatbots can affect users’ beliefs, behaviour, and mental health. His broader research interests include neuropsychiatry and emerging neurotechnology. He is also Core Lead and Trustee for Gaming the Mind, a UK charity promoting positive mental health within the video games community. He was named the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ Core Psychiatric Trainee of the Year in 2023 and was a recipient of the Japanese Society of Psychiatry and Neurology Fellowship Award in 2026.
Moderator:
John Torous, MD, MBI; Cofounder, Society of Digital Psychiatry
Dr Torous is the director of the Digital Psychiatry division in the Department of Psychiatry at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, an affiliated teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School, where he also serves as a staff psychiatrist and member of the academic faculty. He has a background in electrical engineering and computer sciences; he earned his undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley, before pursuing medical school at the University of California, San Diego. Dr Torous completed his psychiatry residency, fellowship in clinical informatics, and master’s degree in biomedical informatics at Harvard. He actively investigates the potential of mobile mental health technologies for psychiatry and has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles and 5 book chapters on the subject. Dr Torous serves as the editor-in-chief of JMIR Mental Health.