Psychology of addictive behaviors : journal of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors
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Psychol Addict Behav · Mar 2021
A large-scale prospective study of big wins and their relationship with future financial and time involvement in actual daily fantasy sports contests.
Early big wins might have a psychological impact upon gamblers that increases their likelihood of intemperate gambling; however, there has been a paucity of empirical research examining this effect using actual gambling data. ⋯ Our results collectively indicate the existence of a big win effect in DFS. For some players, big wins might instill unrealistic expectations about future probabilities of winning and lead to increased-and potentially excessive-engagement. Explanations from cognitive psychology (e.g., the illusion of control) and behavioral psychology (e.g., operant conditioning) might help to explain the big win effect. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).