Griffiths 1994

Method
1. Aim: to investigate cognitive bias involved in gambling behaviour.
2. Hypotheses
  1. 1) [Behavioural] Significant differences in behaviour between regular and non regular gamblers.
  2. 2) [Cognitive] Significant differences between the thought processes of regular and non-regular gamblers.
  3. 3) Regular gamblers would describe themselves as highly skilled, and believe that success in gambling is due to this skill.
  4. 4) Thinking aloud participants would take longer to complete the task than non-thinking aloud participants.
3. 60 participants. All had played fruit machines at least once.
  1. Self-selected: Poster advertisement around a university and college campus.
  2. Regular gamblers: 29M 1F- mean age 21.6yrs. gambled on fruit machines at least once a week.
  3. Non-regular gamblers: 15 M 15F- mean age was 25.5 years. gamblers once a month or less.
4. Quasi- experimental.
5. IV= regular/non-regular gamblers DV= [7] total no. of plays, minutes of play in session, plays per minute, total winnings, no. of wins per session, win rate (time), win rate (plays).
  1. Half of the regular and non-regular gamblers were randomly assigned to the 'thinking aloud' condition.
6. Procedure
  1. All subjects tested individually in a real arcade. Each participant started playing with £3 (equivalent of 30 plays) and were asked to stay on the machine for 60 plays, meaning that they had to break even [quan]. After playing, they were interviewed [qual].
    1. Thinking Aloud- Participants were told to verbalise all of their thoughts whilst playing. This was recorded through a microphone on a lapel. All tapes were transcribed within 48 hours.
Results
1. Regular gamblers made significantly more verbalisations in personifying the machine (e.g. "the machine likes me") and referring to the 'number system' (e.g. "I got a 2 there").
2. Non regular gamblers made significantly more verbalisations relating to confusion and non-understanding.
3. Regular gamblers used a variety of heuristics:
  1. Flexible attributions: "I'm not doing to well here", "This fruity is not in a good mood".
  2. Illusions of control: "I'm only gonna put a quid in to start [...], it bluffs the machine"
  3. Personification: "This machine doesn't like me."
4. Regular gamblers made more irrational verbalisations than non regular gamblers. 14% of the regular gamblers verbalisations were irrational comments compared to 2.5% of the non regular gamblers.
Conclusions
1. Regular gamblers use cognitive biases when gambling. e.g. illusion of control- regular gamblers believed that winning was due to skill rather than luck.
2. Regular gamblers were more likely to express irrational verbalisations e.g. swearing at the machine.
3. All 4 hypotheses were supported.
  1. 1) No difference between reg and non reg gamblers. Regular gamblers only stayed on the machines longer.
  2. 4) Gamblers who thought aloud took longer to gamble, but not significantly.
  3. 2) Regular gamblers referred to winning and non regular gamblers expressed confusion and lack of understanding.
  4. 3) Suggests that gamblers have an illusion of control over the machines: for example, some gamblers objected to being told which machine to use.
Background
1. Heuristics are a set of rules for solving problems.
2. Cognitive Bias': llusion of control, flexible attributions, representativeness, availability bias, illusory correlations and fixation on absolute frequency.
Evaluation
1. Strengths
  1. Qual and quan data [Triangulation] : thinking aloud & no. of wins, etc.
  2. high ecological validity: real arcade, real machines with real money.
  3. Useful- supports use of cognitive behavioural therapy.
  4. High controls increase reliability e.g. use of control group [NRG].
2. Weaknesses
  1. Sample- not generalisable [androcentric, only from one area].
  2. Demand Characteristics- behaviour recorded by standing next to participants, may have changed their behaviour e.g. not swearing.

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