Gambling Addiction - Learning Theory

• gambling; operant conditioning

  physiological rewards - adrenaline rush, increased dopamine

  psychological rewards - the ‘near miss’

  social rewards - peer praise

  financial rewards - experiencing a win
• the ‘big win’ hypothesis

  many pathological gamblers report having a ‘big win’ early in their gambling career or an early prolonged winning streak

  they continue to gamble due to a desire to repeat that early peak experience (aasve, 2003)
• the ‘near miss’

  gambling can provide reinforcement even in the absence of a win

  near misses create a brief period of excitement/thrill that encourage further gambling (reid, 1986)
• partial reinforcement

  the behaviour is only sometimes reinforced (after a predictable (fixed) or unpredictable (variable) - number of responses/period of time)
• variable reinforcement

  a type of partial reinforcement, where a proportion of responses are rewarded, after an unpredictable number of responses or time interval
• research support - partial reinforcement

  horsley et al (2012) subjected high and low frequency gamblers to partial or continuous reinforcement

  after partial reinforcement, high-frequency gamblers continued to respond on gambling stimulation for longer compared to low-frequency gamblers
• research support - operant conditioning

  parke and griffiths (2004) supported the idea that gambling is reinforcing due to the money, thrill and excitement

  also said ‘near misses’ often experienced by gamblers;

  give the gambler the impression they are close to winning and confirm their strategy
• ao3 - learning theory cannot explain all forms of gambling

  some forms of gambling have short-time period between the behaviour and the consequence, whereas other have a much longer period between bet and outcome

  have less to do with chance and simple conditioning and more to do with the skill of the individual
• ao3 - learning theory fails to explain why only some people become addicted

  although many people gamble at some time in their lives and experience reinforcements associated, relatively few become addicts
• ao3 - learning theory is reductionist

  griffiths and delfabbro (2001) reviewed literature on gambling addiction - found that any single explanation was insufficient and an integrated theory of learning, biology and the role of the environment should be developed