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Prizes for sobriety: As Washington meth use rises, this treatment is one of few that works | The Seattle Times

Here’s how the treatment works: You come in a few times a week, complete a urine test, and if it’s negative, you draw for a prize — at a trial McDonell is running in Wallingford, there are “small” prizes like shampoo or a toothbrush, “big” prizes like a coffeemaker, or rare “jumbo” prizes like a DVD player. The longer you’re sober, the more draws you get, but if the test comes back positive, the clinician says “see you next time.”

How Did James Holzhauer Turn ‘Jeopardy!’ Into His Own A.T.M.? We Asked Him - The New York Times

Really, the big risk is never trying anything that looks like a big gamble.

People who cunningly use cooperation and egoism are 'unbeatable' -- ScienceDaily

However, if one of the players was additionally enticed with a bonus, this player would turn into an extortioner in many cases. Despite the fact that the other player would keep trying to discipline them by refusing cooperation, the extortioner would resist and cooperate even less rather than more frequently over the course of the experiment. Extortioners were also shown to be most successful in the long-term, even in the experiment in which the potential bonus player was not predetermined.

Regret is a gambler's curse, neuroscientists say: After placing a bet, gamblers' thought processes focus on regret about past bets -- ScienceDaily

"Right after making a choice and right before finding out about the outcome, the brain is replaying and revisiting nearly every feature of what happened during the previous decision," said senior author Ming Hsu, an associate professor in the Haas School of Business and Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute at UC Berkeley. "Instead of 'I just gambled but maybe I shouldn't have,' it is, 'Last round I gambled and that was a really good choice.' Or, 'I played it safe last time but should have gone for it.'"

Poker Has a ‘Tell’ About Strategic Thinkers - Neuroscience News

The game offers many mechanisms by which players can strategically misinform each other about the value of their cards. Players with strong hands may signal weak hands with small bets to keep the pot growing, and players with weak hands may signal strong hands with large bets to intimidate their opponents into folding before “showdown,” when all players remaining in the game must reveal their hands. Often there is one player left who collects the pot of money. The online version of the game eliminates in-person knowledge of other players, including cues such as eye contact and body language, which could be a disadvantage. However, most online experts take advantage of software and other resources, making up for lack of in-person knowledge by building behavioral dossiers on their opponents and even collecting or buying records of other players’ “hand histories,” Frey said.

Bayes' theorem

Despite the apparent accuracy of the test, if an individual tests positive, it is more likely that they do not use the drug than that they do. This surprising result arises because the number of non-users is very large compared to the number of users; thus, the number of false positives outweighs the number of true positives. To use concrete numbers, if 1000 individuals are tested, there are expected to be 995 non-users and 5 users. From the 995 non-users, 0.01 × 995 ≃ 10 false positives are expected. From the 5 users, 0.99 × 5 ≈ 5 true positives are expected. Out of 15 positive results, only 5, about 33%, are genuine. This illustrates the importance of base rates, and how the formation of policy can be egregiously misguided if base rates are neglected.[15] The importance of specificity in this example can be seen by calculating that even if sensitivity is raised to 100% and specificity remains at 99% then the probability of the person being a drug user only rises from 33.2% to 33.4%, but if the sensitivity is held at 99% and the specificity is increased to 99.5% then probability of the person being a drug user rises to about 49.9%.

Gambling addiction triggers the same brain areas as drug and alcohol cravings: Gambling addiction activates the same brain pathways as drug and alcohol cravings, suggests new research -- ScienceDaily

Gambling addiction activates the same brain pathways as drug and alcohol cravings, suggests new research.