Study finds AI memory and personalization features increase sycophantic behavior

AI companies have touted context retention (memory) and the availability of personal details (personalization) as mechanisms for improving AI model interaction.

Both have value to help keep models from losing the thread of a conversation. But they raise the potential for sycophancy, where models will say what they predict you want to hear, which may not be the most accurate response.

Researchers at Writer, an enterprise AI vendor, have conducted two studies of model memory and personalization that show these capabilities increase sycophancy