
We construct a game-theoretic account of AI-mediated cognitive decoupling in the production and consumption of knowledge content.Extending Spence's costly signalling framework to environments where production costs collapse asymmetrically, we prove that AI-mediated decoupling is a \emph{strictly dominant strategy}under a broad class of utility functions (\emph{Dominant Decoupling Theorem}).This dominance holds not because agents are deceived, but because the observable signal --- a lengthy, well-structured document ---is \emph{decoupled} from its previously costly production process,rendering the signal cheap for all types. We then model the resulting market for cognitive depth as a dynamic signalling game.We show that as AI adoption increases, the market passes through three distinct regimes: a \emph{separating equilibrium} (high-depth agents are distinguishable), a \emph{pooling equilibrium} (all agents produce identical signals), and finally a \emph{Lemons collapse} in which no credible signal remains and the market for deep content unravels (\emph{Signalling Inflation Theorem}).We characterise the speed of this collapse as a function of AI adoption rate and derive the critical adoption threshold $q^*$ beyond which the separating equilibrium is irreversibly destroyed. Finally, we identify two equilibrium escape routes:(i) \emph{certified costliness} --- institutional mechanisms that artificially re-introduce production cost (peer review, Turing-style verification) --- and (ii) \emph{market stratification} --- the emergence of a high-trust, low-volume premium market for ``AI-free'' content.We characterise conditions under which each escape route is stable, and show that without external intervention, the system converges to a pooling equilibrium with socially sub-optimal information production.
pooling equilibrium, signalling theory, AI adoption, Lemons market, information market, social capital, knowledge production, cognitive decoupling, costly signal, Bayesian persuasion, separating equilibrium
pooling equilibrium, signalling theory, AI adoption, Lemons market, information market, social capital, knowledge production, cognitive decoupling, costly signal, Bayesian persuasion, separating equilibrium
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