3/29/2022

Psychology Behind Slot Machines

The Psychology Behind Online Casino Slots and What Makes Them So Popular. In 2016, the global social casino market was estimated at $3.81 billion.Today, online casino gaming, and especially online slots, are getting extremely popular thanks to the worldwide mobile usage and technology leverage. Studies also found that the city’s 39,680 machines earn on average $79,962 a year. The reasons behind the success of slot machines lies in our brains, deep within our psyche which we will explore in this article. Read on to find out the psychology behind our collective attraction to slot machines. The original school of thought behind casino design was developed by Bill Friedman, a professor of casino management at University of Nevada Las Vegas, and author of Designing Casinos to Dominate.

By Alex J. Coyne © Great Bridge Links

Have you ever stopped to think about the psychology of gambling? No, not quite how you can have the mindset of a winner or the perfect expressionless face for the poker table, but instead why mankind feels the need to gamble in the first place. People like odds, people like playing with odds – and people love beating odds. Here’s more about the psychology behind gambling and what makes gamblers tick.

Why we gamble

From a psychological perspective, people gamble for the feeling of the exciting payout of winning. It’s why we’ll take a chance or a risk on pressing the button on the slot machine, or bet a family member five bucks that they won’t eat the entire pudding in one sitting: It’s all about the maybe of winning. This counts for everything from poker and lottery – of course, gamesmanship factors into it too, but the anticipation and potential of payoff is the core of why people feel the need to gamble – or take risks.

Fair play

Beating the house may be fun, but another big draw of gambling, and other card games, is testing both your mettle and luck against other players. Those who may not necessarily be in it to profit do enjoy the social activity and competition, and securing a win no matter the money involved can be considered a major victory in itself when considering that chance and luck play major roles in the games. Take bridge for example – there’s no money involved — the rewards for good bridge have always been primarily the respect and admiration of others.

The rewards

Gambling, and winning, creates chemical changes within the brain. These chemical changes release the brain’s happy hormones and give you the rush of winning the jackpot. For most, that’s where it stops and you can walk away from the table whether you won small or lost big. For some, it doesn’t quite work that way – and they keep chasing the brain’s happy hormone fix. Then, it turns into gambling addiction instead.

The games are designed to take advantage of the psychology

Casino games, especially automated ones, and recreational game software, apps and online, are designed to appeal to those places in our brain that will keep us playing, keep us dropping coins into the slots, or make us spend hours with our computers or Nintendo Switch rather than detail the family car or take the dogs for a nice long walk.

In her book, Addiction by Design, Natasha Dow Schüll notes that some players self-medicate in a kind of ‘machine zone’ while playing which is a result of the interplay between player and machine, rather than being a product of only the player’s personality or the machine’s design. The game’s payout systems are designed to keep the player in the zone with small and unpredictable rewards.

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Online casino platforms promise better chances of winning with promotional codes and free spins such as free spins with Starburst. And although online casino play doesn’t have the same tactile attraction, the payouts are bigger and happen a bit more often which keeps players interested.

Gambling addiction

The Psychology Behind Slot Machines

Why can some gamble responsible and others not? Studies are increasingly showing that gambling addiction affects the same areas in the brain as alcohol and drug addiction, and addicts will achieve similar highs. Why we’re susceptible to being more addictive (or less, or not at all) is down to several factors, a lot of which can include your genetic make-up. Newer research shows that gambling addiction can even be directly linked to the way the brain accepts and processes opiates (Medical Daily).

Psychology Behind Slot Machines Machine

Note: Are you struggling with gambling addiction? We love a great game, but we also accept that responsibility comes with it. If you or someone you love are struggling, seek help with your local authorities. For the US, the National Counsel on Problem Gambling.

Gambling primates, a study in gambling

Yes, there have even been studies on the different ways humans and primates gamble when faced with odds. Putting it simply, potential payoff changes the way your brain is prepared to look at the risk – and the same appears to be true for primates, incredibly.

The same effect can be seen with games that are pay-to-play and games that offer rewards, achievements and badges – like the Skyrim-series and many others that have you running around completing pretty pointless (if fun) minigames. Why do you still do it? Payoff, no matter how small.

Level Up Games

Games of all kinds are a whole lot of fun and most of us would gladly spend our time playing and competing against humans or machines. If you’re a parent concerned with your child’s gaming, or future gaming habits, it’s recommended that you stay away from games that ‘level up’ – in other words, games that work on the habit-forming parts of the brain, requiring the player to repeat activities over and over in order to move up to the next level. Moving from level to level provides the same kind of payoff as a slot machine spewing coins into a plastic dish. Instead, encourage your child to play creative games and games that allow for team play. MineCraft for example, allows both creative play, team play, and has optional monsters for players who prefer to do battle.

And teach your child to play bridge! There are many online bridge apps, including Kida, a Double Dummy app for Kids (and Adults) to learn card play. Click here for more information on learning to play.

The studies on slot play keep coming

By Frank Legato

I just read an article on the “Study Breaks” website titled “The Psychology Behind Slot Games.” It is yet another article that attempts to dissect our brains to reveal why it is we love slot machines, and it’s all stuff I’ve reacted to, debunked and busted on in this space.

So, why not one more time?

Psychology behind slot machines

The article uses psychological references to explain what it is about slot machines that is so appealing, and why the machines can be addicting to some people.

The article explains that the appeal of a slot game can be traced back to research by psychologist B.F. Skinner, and his experiment with pigeons and food pellets. According to the article, Skinner found “that the birds would peck at a lever that provided food more often when the delivery system was randomized, rather than when the food was guaranteed to arrive.”

I’ve argued against this “risk and reward” theory in the past. Think of it. The bird pecks more when a food pellet doesn’t dispense every time. Don’t you think that when food comes every time, the pigeon pecks less because he’s eating, or because he simply isn’t hungry because, you know, he’s just scarfed down a bunch of food pellets?

Also, does pigeon behavior really portend human behavior? Maybe so. I do know that playing slots for a while gives me an urge to go poop on a statue.

The article also relates slot play to the idea of “flow,” the theory of “being completely involved in an activity for its own sake,” as theorized by psychologist Mihaly “Dutch” Csikszentmihalyi.

The idea was researched in direct relation to slot machine play in a study by Natasha Dow “Mountain Girl” Schull, who said some people in her study actually were annoyed when they won on a slot game because it interrupted the “flow” of the reel-spinning.

(Yeah, yeah—I made up the nicknames.)

Psychology Behind Slot Machines Free Play

Look. No matter how mesmerized I am with reel-spinning, an interruption that says “You win!” is never going to annoy me. Unless I bet $5 and I “won” $2, but that’s a subject I’ll address further down the page. I don’t care if I’m meditating on that slot rhythm until I’m semi-comatose. I play slot machines with the hope of winning money, and if the bells and whistles of a big jackpot interrupt my mantra, I don’t get upset. I throw up my arms like I just scored a touchdown.

By the way, the article notes that the “flow,” and the trance created by slot play, is helped by the slot sounds, which are all in the key of C, because it is pleasant to the ear. I verified this via my former band, Voodoo Weasel (yes, “Voodoo Weasel”), when we used to play on a stage on the floor of the Delaware Park casino. We used to be able to tune our guitars to the slot sounds.

I heard once that someone designed a slot game using sounds in F-sharp. It caused players to drop to the ground and spin around on the carpet like Curly.

As usual, the psychologist cited in the “Study Breaks” article says wins that are less than the bet, and near-misses (“7-7-blank,”for instance) just make the player want to play more. Umm, no. In my experience, they make the player want to put his fist through the screen.

Also as usual, the article points to a study from the University of Alberta that concludes the use of credits in slots rather than real money “encourages people to spend more money on a slot game, as they do not see their cash balance depleting in the same way.”

That’s a lot of hooey. When I’m playing, I keep one eye on the credit meter at all times. It’s like the scoreboard. I know how much I want to spend going in, and when that credit meter gets down below my original stake, it’s like the two-minute warning. I’m hoping to score so I make it to overtime.

If you’re a frequent reader of this page, you know I’ve recorded similar reactions in the past to all of these slot studies. I’ve actually had psychologists write letters to me a few times defending their research.

I remember one professor wrote thousands of words of pro- test because I riffed on the fact they used chimpanzees in their research, explaining what parts of the simian brain react the same as the human brain to various stimuli.

I told the professor that this is a humor column, and I only cited his research because monkeys playing slot machines are, well, funny.

Had Skinner used monkeys, I probably would have gotten better grades in Psychology 101.