Social Withdrawal

Description

The person withdraws from family, peers, work, school, faith community, clinical supports, or other real-world relationships.

Rationale

Progressive withdrawal from human contact is a risk amplifier across virtually every SPJ domain. Isolation reduces protective factors, eliminates reality testing, removes people who might observe warning signs, and increases the person's dependence on AI as their primary social world. Withdrawal from clinical supports is particularly concerning.

Evidence Base

• Inside a Mass Shooter’s Harrowing History With ChatGPT

  Mark Follman, 2024. Inside a Mass Shooter’s Harrowing History With ChatGPT. Mother Jones.

  News / journalism

• “You Need to Drop the App”: Online Community Responses to Teens’ Disclosures of Overreliance on AI Companion Chatbots

  Mohammad (Matt) Namvarpour, Ananya Mhetras, Jessica Y Medina, Mamtaj Akter, and Afsaneh Razi, 2026. “You Need to Drop the App”: Online Community Responses to Teens’ Disclosures of Overreliance on AI Companion Chatbots. In ACM Conversational User Interfaces 2026 (CUI ’26), July 21–24, 2026, Bremen, Germany. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 16 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3816046.3816214

  Peer-reviewed study (original research)

• Stumbling Into AI Emotional Dependence: How Routine AI Interactions Reshape Human Connection

  Yaoxi Shi, Cathy Mengying Fang, Pattie Maez, Amit Goldenberg, 2026. Stumbling Into AI Emotional Dependence: How Routine AI Interactions Reshape Human Connection. arXiv, 2606.04150. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2606.04150

  Preprint

• Delusional Experiences Emerging From AI Chatbot Interactions or “AI Psychosis”

  Hudon A, Stip E, 2024. Delusional Experiences Emerging From AI Chatbot Interactions or “AI Psychosis”. JMIR Ment Health, 12, e85799. doi: 10.2196/85799.

  Commentary / Editorial

• AI-associated delusions: the missing dimension of mortality

  Idris Altinisik, Utku Igcioglu, Murat Emul, 2024. AI-associated delusions: the missing dimension of mortality. Lancet Psychiatry, Vol 13, pages 456. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(25)00396-7.

  Commentary / Editorial

• AI companions and adolescent social relationships: Benefits, risks, and bidirectional influences

  Xiaoran Sun, Yunqi Wang, Brandon T. McDaniel, 2026. AI companions and adolescent social relationships: Benefits, risks, and bidirectional influences. Child Development Perspectives, 20(2), 91–98. https://doi.org/10.1093/cdpers/aadaf009

  Peer-reviewed study (original research)