Effect of outcome on arousal: relation to gambling frequency and incentive

Previous research has shown that frequent gamblers experience greater heart rate increases when winning than infrequent gamblers do. Male and female undergraduate students played a computer game of chance, with or without an incentive. Heart rate was measured to determine whether having an incentive affected arousal. The South Oaks Gambling Screen (SOGS) was administered to identify frequent gamblers. It was hypothesized that there would be an interaction between the effect of the incentive whether the person was a frequent or infrequent gambler. Results were in the predicted direction but no significant differences between conditions were detected. This failure to replicate previous findings will be discussed.