Why Are Casino Games so Irresistible?

Urban Toronto

25 May 2021

Casual gambling is a popular entertainment choice for a lot of people. Psychologists have uncovered that risk versus reward is more critical for the brain than winning the wager.

So, gamblers can still enjoy casino games as a social activity and call it a day even if they don’t win.

Recent studies have shown that gambling can become addictive if you compulsively repeat the same action repeatedly, just like any other experience that triggers dopamine releases (a.k.a, “the happy chemical”).

Shopping, drinking alcohol, and compulsive eating are prime examples of addictive behaviours. What happens is that the brain becomes conditioned to repeating that action and triggering the reward system again.

We have researched how gambling addiction works and if there are any efficient ways to prevent it. We were surprised by some of our findings initially. Still, we managed to identify a solution to responsibly play casino games.

Keep reading to discover how you can keep gambling for pure entertainment:

What makes gambling addictive?

According to Mayo Clinic, compulsive gambling is the uncontrollable need to keep wagering despite the negative impact it has on your personal life. To gamble means risking something in an attempt to get a better return.

Just like drugs and alcohol stimulate your reward system, gambling is addictive. This compulsive behaviour will lead to chasing your losses, hiding your casino activities from your peers, getting in debt oreven resort to criminal activities like theft or fraud to support your gambling needs.

If you feel the need to repeat this destructive behaviour, it means that you have reached an addiction point. Your brain’s wiring has been altered and undoing it will take months or even years.

When you reach this stage, gambling is damaging more than your wallet. In 2013, scientists updated the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) to include gambling as an addiction similar to substance abuse. Before that, casino gaming was considered a compulsion is driven by the need for anxiety relief.

What happens to your brain when you gamble?

Suppose you want to understand how addiction works. In that case, you will first have to learn more about how our brain works when we’re engaged in entertaining activities.

We all have a set of circuits known as thereward centre. The wires are connected to different brain areas, primarily focused on the ones responsible for pleasure and motivation.

Any rewarding experience (like finishing a task, receiving a compliment or winning a game) sends signals to the brain via neurotransmitters - the naturally created chemicals stimulating or depressing our neurons.

One of the most important chemicals responsible for our evolution as a species is dopamine. A large dose of this substance will put you in a state of euphoria and maximum pleasure that will motivate you to repeat the same action over and over again.

That’s why illicit drugs work so well. They release a hefty dose of dopamine that can be up to 10 times higher than the amount generated by naturally rewarding experiences.

The same thing happens when you gamble.

Recent studies on the gambler’s brain have uncovered that the activation sequence of the reward system is similar to the effect of drugs.

That’s why people that are just getting started like the experience so much – they get a chemical reward surge that makes them extremely happy.

But there’s an issue – while most people can quickly leave the casino after spinning the reels for a while, there are people that simply don’t know how to stop.

Why?

Scientists have uncovered that more factors are at play when it comes to gambling addiction, including an underactive brain reward system, tolerance, peer pressure,and adhering to “the new norm.”

These are called genetic predispositions. They dictate our decision-making process when it comes to a wide range of activities, including gambling.

Psychological factors that influence addiction

The following five psychological factors make gambling seem compelling even after experiencing massive losses:

Availability heuristic – we tend to overestimate the probability of an event, mainly thanks to our brain’s ability to reproduce examples of moments when it did happen. Scientists show that after remembering or watching the news about a player winning a large sum, gamblers are more likely to try gambling, thinking that their odds have magically improved.
Gambler’s fallacy – the most common belief of gambling addicts, is that each loss increases their chances of winning. If you were to do the math, you would quickly understand that there’s no correlation between losing and winning. All the outcomes are entirely random, and your odds remain unchanged despite the previous results.
Loss aversion – behavioural psychology has proven that we are more sensitive to losses than wins of the same value. Studies show that you will have a more impactful emotional reaction to losing C$10 than you get when you win C$10. That’s why gamblers constantly invest more time and money to try recouping their losses, which blurs the line between addiction and entertainment
Partial reinforcement – players know that their chances of winning are somewhere between 0% and 100%. Still, they justify a loss by considering it part of the process. This way, they falsely expect to be positively reinforced after some time, motivating them to keep playing.
The illusion of control – Since it’s in our nature to want to be in control, gamblers think that they have the power to influence the outcome. This bias explains why people, frustrated by the unpredictable odds of casino games, blow on the dice or wear “symbols of luck.” That simply doesn’t work.

These psychological biases, amplified by genetic predispositions, make it easier to fall into the trap of addiction. Since gambling operators are unethically using the laws of human nature to maximize their revenue, it can be difficult to notice that you’ve become a compulsive gambler.

Fortunately, there are many ways to prevent gambling, and most of them are available for free on the Internet.

Gambling addiction prevention

Any addiction can be overcome if you have strong power of will.

Still, there aren’t any fool-proof methods that can guarantee you will quit gambling after completing it. There are dozens of programs out there that can help you minimize your risks of becoming addicted.

Do you feel like gambling is no longer in your control?

Please consider avoiding any casino-related activities. If you can’t do it by yourself, don’t panic.

You can use a gambling addiction institutions list to find a community or Gambler Anonymous group where professionals will help you deal with your compulsive behaviour and fix the issue before it’s too late.

Skinner Boxing Casino Games

Even if you haven’t heard of the Skinner Box game design before, it’s essential to consider it when gambling since it plays a crucial part in the addiction cycle.

B.F. Skinner’s research on mice has played a crucial role in developing modern casino games. Still, it also shows how easy it is to trick the brain into repeating the same action repeatedly, no matter how destructive it is.

Here’s a quick non-technical definition:

Our brains respond differently to stimuli that are predictable than to unpredictable ones. Think of your brain as a supercomputer that is continually looking for patterns to determine how things around it work.

Casino and video games alike use the Skinner Box principle to keep you engaged by presenting different patterns (visual, audio or environmental cues) that stimulate our brain to want more action.

For every small victory, you get a tiny dopamine release that brings you a feeling of satisfaction. Dopamine plays a crucial role in learning, and it represents the biological reason why you get immense pleasure from mastering a game (like. Poker or Blackjack)

Neurotransmitters have many use cases for the brain. Still, we want to focus on dopamine’s impact on learning and how it can create neurological pathways that determine our ability to learn.

Think about it for a second:

Whenever you solve a complex puzzle in a video game after dozens of tries, a rush of dopamine floods your brain, offering you intense satisfaction. This is a sign that the brain is learning, telling you to “Remember what you just did so you can repeat in the future”

However, when the system is exposed to random stimuli (like a slot machine), it will keep pumping dopamine, searching for a pattern. Every time you get a payout from the slots, your brain receives another neurotransmitter, “fix.”

Scientists argue that compulsive gamblers are not addicted to what they can win but rather to the dopamine rush. This theory makes sense considering that after a victory, our brain will actively try finding a pattern that can bring you similar returns.

The problem?

There is no pattern. Slot machines are operated by a random number generator software, so getting the same results throughout a gambling session is highly unlikely.

Even though most gamblers know that you can’t master the slots, our brains are hardwired to try to make sense of the chaos around us without being able to tell the difference between “there aren’t any patterns” and “I haven’t discovered the patterns yet.”

To be honest, a slot machine that would pay out a fixed amount after a given number of spins would not last too long on the casino floor. That’s because our brain gets bored quickly once it uncovered the solution to a puzzle.

Be aware: The Skinner Box design cannot be labelled as “good” or “bad.” It’s up to the game developer to create a balanced invariable reward ratio, which is generally correlated with the success of a casino game.

Final thoughts

Now that you have a better overview of how addiction works, you understand that gambling is not always glitz and glamour like the Las Vegas commercials. Sometimes, playing at the casino can be a harmful activity that can negatively impact your career and family life.

The solution is to become an advocate of responsible gambling by setting a budget and learning how to manage your bankroll without spending more than you can afford