How to Use sycophancy in a Sentence

sycophancy

noun
  • His sycophancy has left him disbarred and broke.
    — John Avlon, The Atlantic, 25 May 2026
  • Trump’s sycophancy didn’t change Xi’s mind on Iran either.
    — Michael Schuman, The Atlantic, 15 May 2026
  • For my details on how to fight back against AI sycophancy, see the link here.
    — Lance Eliot, Forbes.com, 18 May 2026
  • This sycophancy is a known issue in the industry.
    — Robert Hart, Time, 5 Aug. 2025
  • Ignore the sycophancy, slurs, and slop, and there is very little—but still enough to make one wonder.
    — Eliot A. Cohen, The Atlantic, 29 Jan. 2026
  • One of the main culprits is the models’ propensity for sycophancy.
    — Allison Parshall, Scientific American, 18 June 2026
  • Yeah, there is nothing but sycophancy and repulsing his enemies.
    — Leah Feiger, WIRED, 19 Sep. 2024
  • This reminds me of the AI sycophancy handwringing.
    — Lance Eliot, Forbes.com, 18 May 2026
  • Ready Player One takes this geek sycophancy to an entirely new level.
    — Ryan Smith, Chicago Reader, 8 Jan. 2018
  • Hierarchies breed a hell of a lot of sycophancy and resentment, and this one is no different.
    — Hillary Kelly, The Atlantic, 14 Mar. 2025
  • A certain amount of sycophancy toward the more bizarre elements of the coalition is also common.
    — Benjamin Mazer, The Atlantic, 25 Nov. 2024
  • If sycophancy is the measure, Vance is clearly the leading contestant.
    — Dana Milbank, Washington Post, 14 June 2024
  • As noted above, the emphasis was on the states of evil, sycophancy, and hallucination.
    — Lance Eliot, Forbes.com, 15 Sep. 2025
  • Groupthink and sycophancy played a role in Iraqi decision-making, the records show, but not as much as might have been expected.
    — Amatzia Baram, Foreign Affairs, 1 July 2012
  • Most of the attackers are just pilot fish, trying to outdo one another in being vicious in their sycophancy.
    — Liz Smith, Vulture, 31 Jan. 2024
  • For my analysis of the AI sycophancy trend that is undermining human minds, see the link here.
    — Lance Eliot, Forbes.com, 18 May 2026
  • The causal claim here is that the AI feature of sycophancy reduces a user’s desire to repair conflict.
    — Thomas H. Davenport, The Conversation, 12 Nov. 2025
  • This has created a problem of sycophancy, where AI flatters users to improve their rankings.
    — Francis Brero, Forbes.com, 25 Feb. 2026
  • This is often described as sycophancy bias, meaning the AI behaves like a people pleaser.
    — David Talby, Forbes.com, 20 Mar. 2026
  • Politeness and adapting to someone’s communication style are not the same as sycophancy.
    — Cody Turner, The Conversation, 1 May 2026
  • Models often learn to flatter users, a tendency known as sycophancy, and will sometimes prioritize this over honesty.
    — Ronan Farrow, New Yorker, 6 Apr. 2026
  • Still, sycophancy is an effective path to favor with any President, especially this one.
    — Susan B. Glasser, The New Yorker, 12 July 2019
  • Instead, the election devolved into mudslinging and sycophancy.
    — Geeta Anand, New York Times, 23 Mar. 2016
  • Then come the inevitable policy mistakes, as ideology and sycophancy overwhelm sound advice.
    — Daron Acemoglu, Foreign Affairs, 23 Mar. 2020
  • This sycophancy isn't accidental.
    — ArsTechnica, 25 Aug. 2025
  • The chairman’s power endures amid a culture of sycophancy and clannish distrust of anyone outside his inner circle of party bosses.
    — Frank Scaturro, National Review, 13 July 2017
  • The upstart Carlin was sidling uncomfortably close to charging Wengrow with sycophancy or even careerism.
    — Virginia Heffernan, Wired, 11 July 2022
  • Other tests showed that models can show what’s called a sycophancy bias — the tendency of an LLM to backpedal on a correct answer to please the user.
    — Stephen Ornes, Quanta Magazine, 8 Nov. 2024
  • One idea is to require AI companies to run and then publish sycophancy audits of their models – tests that show how well their products meet honesty benchmarks.
    — Cody Turner, The Conversation, 1 May 2026
  • Study came out a little while ago, talking about sycophancy in LLM chats and its effect on sort of attribution of fault during conflict.
    — Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic, 3 Apr. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'sycophancy.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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