The Psychology of Crypto Gambling: Why It’s So Addictive?

Despite being a highly popular fun activity, gambling, especially crypto gambling, is yet to earn acceptance as a safe social activity. The reason is the addictive aspect behind it.

Crypto gambling, like any other gambling, is highly addictive. Once the player gets used to gambling, they may find it difficult to stop it. The section below analyses the psychology of crypto gambling and checks why it is so addictive.

What Makes Crypto Gambling Addictive?

Some of the essential reasons why crypto gaming becomes addictive are:

• The high number of incentives and monetary benefits from winning.
• Crypto gambling carries high risk. The thrill of overcoming such a challenging situation to win is highly addictive.
• The adrenaline rush from winning highly challenging bets and gambles.

When a player gambles excessively, the rewards earned make their brain alter in such a way as to expect them more frequently. This changes the neuro signals that the brain sends across the body. The brain gradually gets conditioned into wanting more gambling pleasure and slowly spirals into a severe addiction.

The Science Behind the Crypto Gambling Addiction

Crypto gambling starts in the human body as a simple activity that brings pleasure, thrill, and joy. The nerves of the human brain are wired and connected in multiple ways. One such method is by joining the motivation and pleasure centers of the brain. This connection is called the Reward system of the human brain.

All kinds of rewarding experiences, like winning a match, performing well in an exam, gaining physical pleasure, etc., activate the brain’s reward system, sending neurotransmitters across the reward system.

Dopamine is the primary neurotransmitter in the reward system. When the reward system is stimulated, and dopamine is released, the person feels a sense of high pleasure and euphoria. It also leads to a natural feeling of increased motivation to repeat the activity to earn satisfaction again.

People feel further motivated to engage in crypto gambling activities due to this activity of the brain’s reward system and dopamine. An action would take nearly a month or more to develop into an addiction.

Other Psychological Factors for Why Crypto Gambling is So Addictive

Some other psychological factors are also said to be responsible for the gradual addiction that develops toward crypto gaming. Some of them are:

1. Partial Reinforcement

• It means actions with only a 50-50 chance of getting rewarded.
• Crypto gambling poses both the chances to win and lose.
• The gamblers are aware of the low chances of winning.
• But the dopamine secretion makes them reinforce that winning is possible, and thus, they keep on expecting wins and continue gambling.

2. Gambler’s Fallacy

• Gambler’s fallacy is a psychological belief that the possibility of winning increases each time when the player loses a bet.
• Although the winning possibility does not increase or decrease with the number of losses, the player gets into the assumption and believes it firmly.
• So, in such situations, losing a bet would only motivate them more to engage in the next bet as, according to them, the winning possibilities have increased.

Some more psychological factors also play a role in crypto gambling addiction. They are:

• The illusion of control over the chances of winning.
• Developing aversion toward losing
• Overestimating the probability of winning