What's a gambler's fallacy?

What's a gambler's fallacy?

Before Steve Coogan's most famous creation, Alan Partridge, made it onto our TV screens and the big screen, he was first brought to life in a radio show. In one memorable episode, Alan manages to lose a large amount of money, plus his wife's car, due to his belief in a gambler's fallacy.

Taking on a fictional gambler from Texas, Alan confidently asserts that when a coin is spun and it lands on heads, on the next spin it has to land on tails because 'it's 50/50'. In his first spin, Alan's logic seems to work as he wins a small amount of money from the Texan, which he kindly donates to charity.

On the second toss of the coin, his faulty logic once again prevails and he wins a considerably larger amount of money (which he has paid to himself). Confident that he has the secret to gambling success, Alan offers the Texan a third and final wager, for the Texan's expensive sports car. Alan follows his faulty logic only this time, his bet loses.

It is a genuinely funny moment and one of a number of classic Alan Partridge memories, but underlying the entire scene is one simple misunderstanding and that is Alan's unstinting belief in the Gambler's Fallacy.

What is the Gambler's Fallacy?

There are many potential definitions of a Gambler's Fallacy but the easiest to understand is to say that a Gambler's Fallacy is when an individual believes that an entirely random chain of events is likely to be influenced by the events that have happened previously.

In the example above, Alan's Gambler's Fallacy was that he erroneously believed that when you spin a coin and it lands 'heads', when you spin the coin the next time it will land 'tails'.

Of course, almost every person will realise that this is not the case and that this is a somewhat extreme version of a Gambler's Fallacy, but it does neatly exemplify the issue in a simple way.

Why doesn't a Gambler's Fallacy work?

It's very easy to explain why a gambler's fallacy doesn't work and that is because when you are looking at something like tossing a coin, playing a slot machine, rolling dice or spinning the roulette wheel, there is no 'conscious' decision on the part of the coin, slot, dice or wheel in order to produce an outcome.

None of the items listed previously have any awareness of what the results have been of previous spins or rolls. As such, each individual roll of the dice, spin of the slot or roulette or toss of the coin is entirely random.

However, when we view odds that state "the outcome of a coin toss is 50/50 that it will land heads or tails" our human mind understands this and you can therefore reason that because the last spin of the coin was heads, the next one is more likely to be tails.

That is not the case. Every toss of the coin is 50/50, such as every time you spin a European Roulette wheel, you have a 37/1 shot of correctly predicting which of the slots the ball will settle in. In a slot, given that the slot is governed by a Random Number Generator (RNG) which is a truly random piece of software, this means that regardless of the outcome of any previous spin, you have as much chance of winning the jackpot on your next spin as you do any other, even if you won the jackpot on a previous spin.

The reason Gambler's Fallacies are very appealing to humans is that they appeal to a certain logic within us. If you spin on a roulette wheel and the last six numbers to come up have been odd, you'd think that it seems more likely the next number would be even. That is not the case, but it just seems that this is what should happen to us.

It is one of the most common mistakes a novice gambler can make and it can prove to be expensive at times (as Alan Partridge found out to his and his wife's cost!). So let's take a look at some common examples of Gambler's Fallacy that are based around some of the most popular casino games.

What are some common examples of Gambler's Fallacy?

1. Slots

There are many different gambler's fallacy in operation surrounding online slots, but arguably the most common one is that a slot is either 'primed' ready to pay out, or seeing as it has just paid out one jackpot, it will not pay out again for a considerable time.

As we have already stated, modern online slots have a random number generator at their heart and what this means is that every spin is random, regardless of how much, or how little, you have won on the slot previously.

Strange and counter-intuitive it may seem to be to us, but if you win the jackpot on a slot, then you have exactly the same chances of winning the jackpot on your very next spin, as you did on the spin prior when you did win.

Slots are a breeding ground for many other gamblers fallacies including the belief that slots run 'hot' and 'cold' (often at the behest of a casino) or that a slot has to take a certain amount of money from a player, or from several players, before it will pay out a larger sum. Once again, all these beliefs are entirely false.

2. Roulette

In Roulette many gamblers believe that the random spins on the wheel can produce a 'pattern' which the player can then follow in order to win. For example, if the last few results of the wheel have been Odd Odd, Even, Even, Odd Odd, Even, many people will believe that the next spin will be even.

That of course, isn't the case. What is interesting to note is how these patterns occur. They occur simply due to the random nature of each spin. Over thousands or millions of spins, there will be times when 'unusual' patterns or numbers of similar spins occurs. That is the random nature of the machine at work.

Indeed, it can be argued it would be evidence of an unfair machine if these events did NOT occur over a long time period.

In 1913 at the Monte Carlo casino, the ball fell into a black slot 26 times in a row. An extremely uncommon occurrence. This cost gamblers at the casino millions of francs as they bet against black, assuming that the next spin had to be red as otherwise the randomness would be 'imbalanced'.

Will you always lose if you bet following a Gambler's Fallacy?

You may not always lose when following a Gambler's Fallacy, in our very first example remember, Alan won twice before losing it all on his third wager, but what is definitely true is that if you follow a gambler's fallacy, sooner or later you are likely to lose a bet and what is without doubt is the logic you are following is entirely faulty.

So remember, just because you won nothing on the last ten spins of the slot, doesn't mean that you are guaranteed to win something on your next ten spins. Nor is the next spin of the roulette wheel likely to result in a 'red' number being selected when the last six have all been black. View each spin of the reels or wheels as completely independent and random events and you won't fall for any Gambler's Fallacy again.

Byline: This article was written and published by Henry Regal.