Background: Human decision-making is often affected by prior selections and their outcomes, even in situations\nwhere decisions are independent and outcomes are unpredictable.\nMethods: In this study, we created a task that simulated real-life non-strategic gambling to examine the effect of\nprior outcomes on subsequent decisions in a group of male college students.\nResults: Behavioral performance showed that participants needed more time to react after continuous losses\n(LOSS) than continuous wins (WIN) and discontinuous outcomes (CONTROL). In addition, participants were more\nlikely to repeat their selections in both WIN and LOSS conditions. Functional MRI data revealed that decisions in\nWINs were associated with increased activation in the mesolimbic pathway, but decreased activation in the inferior\nfrontal gyrus relative to LOSS. Increased prefrontal cortical activation was observed during LOSS relative to WIN and\nCONTROL conditions.\nConclusion: Taken together, the behavioral and neuroimaging findings suggest that participants tended to repeat\nprevious selections during LOSS trials, a pattern resembling the gamblerââ?¬â?¢s fallacy. However, during WIN trials,\nparticipants tended to follow their previous lucky decisions, like the ââ?¬Ë?hot handââ?¬â?¢ fallacy.
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