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Cognitive Biases Sunk Cost & Variable Reward
Just One More
You paid a 100-coin entry to sit at this machine — that is already gone. You start with 60 coins to play.
1Each spin costs 10 coins and pays out a random amount.
2Spin as often as you like, or walk away whenever you want.
3The average payout quietly shrinks with every spin you take.
4There is a point where spinning stops being worth it. Find it, then leave.
The concept· Arkes & Blumer, 1985
Sunk Cost & Variable Reward
The sunk cost fallacy is the urge to keep investing in something because of what you have already put in. Variable rewards — unpredictable wins — make it far harder to stop.
Together these two forces keep people in losing bets, dead-end projects, and endless feeds. The past spend cannot be recovered by spending more, yet it feels like it can.