Casino Lights Could Be Warping Your Brain to Take Risks, Scientists . . . The researchers think circadian photoreception, which is our non-visual response to light, is playing a part here The level of blue spectrum light may be activating specific eye cells connected to brain regions in charge of decision-making, emotional regulation, and processing risk versus reward scenarios
Blue Light Makes People Take More Gambling Risks However, under blue-heavy light similar to casino machines, “the $100 loss didn’t appear to feel as bad, so people were more willing to take the risk ” How Blue Light Rewires Risk Perception The mechanism behind this effect involves specialized cells in the eye called intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells, which respond primarily to blue light wavelengths around 480 nanometers
Casino Lights and Sounds Encourage Risky Decision Making “Using eye-tracker technology, we were able to see that people were paying less attention to information about the odds of winning on a particular gamble when money imagery and casino jingles accompanied the wins,” said the study’s senior author Catharine Winstanley, professor in the UBC department of psychology and investigator at the Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health
Could lighting be the new gambling regulator? – News “But under bright, blue-heavy light such as that seen in casino machines, the $100 loss didn’t appear to feel as bad, so people were more willing to take the risk ” The study suggests that blue light alters neural processing in brain regions tied to reward and decision-making, such as the amygdala and habenula, possibly dampening negative emotions associated with losses
Study: Flashing lights, catchy sounds in casinos lead gamblers to take . . . “We found that an individual’s choices were less guided by the odds of winning when the casino-like audiovisual features were present in our laboratory gambling game,” says lead author Mariya Cherkasova, a postdoctoral research fellow at the university, in a release “Overall, people took more risks when playing the more casino-like games, regardless of the odds ”