Cognitive theory - cognitive bias

• Cognitive bias is where a persons thinking, memory and attentional processes are faulty leading an individual to make irrational judgements and poor decisions for example continuing to gamble despite huge losses
• Cognitive bias

  1. Skill bias - illusion of control

  > Addicts overestimate their ability to influence random events believing they have special skills or knowledge which may make them more likely to win

  > For example, they believe they are skilled at choosing lottery number, making them more likely to gamble.

  2. Ritual bias

  > Addicted gamblers believe they have a greater chance of winning if they have engaged in 'lucky rituals'

  > E.g blowing on dice before rolling, wearing a certain item of clothing when betting or choosing a certain fruit machine to bet on.
• Cognitive bias 2

  1. Selective recall bias

  > Addicted gamblers remember wins but forget losses leading to them gambling more, loss may be described as a near win

  > For example, they are more likely to recall their wins on scratch cards but minimize the number of times they lost

  2. Gamblers fallacy

  > Addicted gamblers have distorted views about chance - they believe a run of losses must be followed by a win

  > A gambler might have lost 6 times and therefore believe they can’t lose again, and the next bet must be a win
• Self-efficacy - low self-efficacy = greater chance of relapse

  > Self-efficacy refers to a persons beliefs about control or lack of control over their behaviour

  > Addicts with low self-efficacy believe they cannot give up gambling and it will always be apart of them, leading to relapse

  > This leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy in which the individual continues to gamble because their belief is they cant stop themselves

  > This causes their gambling addiction to be reinforced as the relapse confirms their beliefs “see I told you I couldn’t stop
• Cognitive theory AO3

  :) RTS Griffiths

  > Natural experiment on a sample of 30 regular gamblers comparing them to a control group of 30 occasional gamblers. They played on a fruit machine and were asked to verbalise their thought processes whilst playing and were interviewed afterwards

  > They found that regular gamblers saw themselves as ‘skilful’ at the fruit machine, made more irrational statements “I’m going to bluff this machine” compared to occasional gamblers.

  > This supports the role of cognitive biases such as illusion of control in gambling addiction.
• Cognitive theory AO3

  :( However, the use of ‘thinking aloud’ research has been questioned. This self-report method is used in a lot of studies in to the cognitive explanation of gambling

  > Some psychologists believe that what people say in gambling situations does not necessarily represent what they really believe

  > Researchers may get misleading impression that gamblers’ thought processes are irrational when in fact they are not. Limiting the validity of the research used to support the cognitive explanation of gambling
• Cognitive theory AO3

  :) Practical applications

  > Addiction is caused by cognitive biases and faulty though processes has led to the development of cognitive behaviour therapy

  > This is effective in treating behaviour by identifying and challenging the irrational and faulty thought processes that have lead an individual to gamble and changing them into rational and logical thought processes

  > The cognitive explanation is an important part of applied psychology.