Professor of psychology deciphers the way gambling distorts the truth and causes your brain to trap

Always, you are just close to winning.

How do you understand gambling - they are "chance games" , which bring joy and random luck? So you're as naive as most people, thinking that you are involved in some kind of gambling just because you're happy, because money or like the thrill it brings.

But Mike Robinson, an assistant professor of psychology at Wesleyan University, USA does not think so. With 15 years of experience researching how addictive elements affect the brain, he understands that gambling contains sinister traps.

For the most part, game producers and designers know how to trap you into a spiral of addiction. And once addicted, gambling will become compulsory.

What makes some people gamble even when they are no longer happy? Why do people still try to play when they know the game is designed just to lose? Is it that when people play silver, some people are worse than the rest, or are they simply worse off?

Turns out, all kinds of gambling until games like Candy Crush are being built on a dark science. Now, Robinson will help you decipher those things:

1. The nature of the addiction of gambling lies in uncertainty

Uncertainty creates a reward that plays an important role in the attraction of gambling.

One of the salient features of gambling is uncertainty - whether it is the size of the jackpot or its probability of winning - all uncertain. Uncertainty creates a reward that plays an important role in the attraction of gambling.

It involves dopamine, a neurotransmitter released by the brain in activities that bring excitement, from eating, sex to drug use. In situations where rewards are uncertain, dopamine is also released by the brain.

The special release of dopamine increases in the moments when players expect an uncertain reward they will receive. This effect explains why the release of dopamine is associated with the "critical" level of gambling and the severity of one's gambling addiction. It also plays a role in strengthening risky bet behavior.

Studies have shown that dopamine is released during gambling in brain regions similar to drug abuse. In fact, repeated exposure to gambling and uncertain rewards creates long-term changes in the human brain, similar to what drugs cause.

These rewarding trails will become sensitive, similar to those of drug addicts. Animal studies show changes in the brain caused by uncertainty that can even increase the appetite and cravings of the gambler.

And yet, repeated gambling to expose uncertainty can even change the way you react to losing results.

The paradox is that, for gambling addicts, losing and losing money triggers the dopamine release almost the same as when they won. As a result, losing also makes the gambler more giddy than leaving the slot machine or getting up from scratch.

2. Light and sound in the casino

Sound and light in the gambling environment can also make you play longer.

But gambling also goes beyond winning and losing. The environment with a series of flashing lights and noisy sounds can also make you completely immersive as a gambler. This is especially true in a bustling casino. But even a video game or phone gambling app will attract you with lots of cumbersome sounds and images.

Is it true that producers only do it for style? Studies show that the lights and sounds often found in gambling environments become more attractive and have the ability to urge gamblers to play when they are linked to reward uncertainty.

In particular, the signals when winning - such as the ringing bells of the same length as each prize of the same jackpot magnitude - both increase excitement for the gambler and make they are more optimistic about winning.

Important, the sounds and light in the gambling environment can also make you play longer and encourage you to bet bigger and more.

3. The feeling of victory even when losing

These new gaming machines create more enjoyment and are preferred by players.

Over the past few decades, casinos and game producers have significantly upgraded their slot gambling machines. Gambling machines were removed with old mechanical arms and coils to switch to electronic versions.

These new computer-based games bring more light color and sound more attractive. They also have more spin, opening a new era of multi-slot slot machines.

There are many slots that allow players to place a range of different bet levels for each spin, usually up to 20 or more options. Although the bet may be small, many players place maximum bets in terms of quantity for each spin.

This strategy means that players can win in some categories, while losing in the remaining categories, real interest is lower than traditional play.

Even if you "win", you're not really profitable, a phenomenon called "losing the disguise" . However, because there were victories, even if it was a disguised victory, it still came with the light and sound of victory.

As a result, these new gaming machines create more excitement and are preferred by players. The important thing is that machines now tend to make gamblers overestimate their true winning frequency.

A significant increase in the frequency of victory, whether real or virtual, creates a lot of stimulation and activates rewarding trails in the brain, accelerating the rate of change that occurs in the brain as analyzed above.

New-style gaming machines with multiple doors also promote the development of "dark flow". In particular, players are attracted to an hourly game, they continuously win "virtual" (eg, placing 20 VND to win 15 VND) until losing. Dark flow brings a sense of continuous money, despite the fact that players are constantly losing money.

4. Always like that: You are just close to winning

The near-hit effect is more stimulating than losing.

The popularity of electronic slot machines also means that the results can be programmed on virtual rolls, unrestricted by the physical arrangement of the rotating plots on each roll. Therefore, game designers can make certain results happen more often than other results.

This includes close results, when a scroll bar stops just before or immediately after the moment it aligns into a jackpot. Nearly successful results trigger a region of the brain that often responds to real victory, increasing the desire of the player to make them play more. This is especially true for gambling addicts.

The close-up phenomenon does not only appear on gambling machines or in casinos. The addictive video games on the phone, such as Candy Crush, all apply near-hit effects.

The near-hit effect is even more stimulating than just losing - it is both frustrating but also more pleasant than a strong loss. But basically, the feeling of being close to victory causes even more impulse than real victory.

Close hits make the player more eager and more likely to bet in the game, and they also increase the time to participate in the game than intended. The dopamine response to the actual outcome is also in line with an individual's level of addiction to gambling.

5. Its real gambling and game

All games of chance are designed with appeal that makes players get caught up longer.

When participating in entertaining gambling games, you are not simply playing against odds. You also have to fight an enemy created in the art of deception and malice.

Every game of chance is designed with an appeal that makes players get caught up longer, and even when they run out of money and leave, they also think that they have done better than their chances.

For many people, these carefully designed and designed results still make them happy and satisfied when they play. Despite all the money, the gambler still left without thinking.

But gambling is not just a promise of luck, that at some point you'll win a jackpot. Surveys in the US show that up to 2% of the gambling addicts suffer mental health problems.

Gambling addiction becomes the most popular, out of the few addictions that do not involve the consumption of addictive substances. Like other forms of addiction, gambling disorder is a lonely and isolated experience. It is associated with increasing anxiety, and the gambler has a higher risk of suicide.

For gambling-sensitive individuals, the hook that game designers have created is really too sinister. What is the solution to this problem? It was still in the endless rotation of gambling machines.