Predicting Risky Decision Making (Odds Selection) in Regular Soccer Gamblers from Nigeria using Cognitive Tasks Combined with Non-Cognitive Measures.

As real time soccer gambling is becoming a game of choice for many Nigerian youths, there is need to examine some predictive factors that could account for risky decision making in the population. We combined some cognitive tasks (memory, concentration, executive function and problem solving) and non-cognitive measures (time taken to complete a bet, years of gambling and addiction tendency measures) to derive a more parsimonious model of predicting risky decision making in this population. Twenty-eight undergraduate students that endorsed regular involvement (at least once a week) in soccer betting and were willing to come to the psychology lab for testing were recruited. Four neuropsychological measures (Craft Story 21: Immediate and delayed, Number Span Test: Forward and backward, Trail Making Test: A&B, Tower of Hannoi and a gambling questionnaire (Gamblers Anonymous Questionnaire) were used for the study. Study design was correlational and linear regression (step wise method) was used for data analysis. Step wise regression statistics yielded nine possible model combinations with high predictive strengths. Overall, model 9 (with adjusted R2 = 0.57) that has 6 measures including one from non-cognitive and 5 from cognitive measures was adjudged to be most parsimonious putting into consideration its predictive strength and number of tasks required. The tasks in our most parsimonious model were: time taken to complete a bet (non-cognitive), Craft Story 21: immediate (cognitive: memory), Number Span Forward: Total correct and longest correct (cognitive: concentration), Trail Making Test: B (cognitive: executive function) and Tower of Hannoi: Time taken to complete (cognitive: problem solving). Pearson product moment correlation between the predictor variables and the dependent variable (number of odds selected) showed inverse correlation of Craft Story Immediate, Number Span total correct and Number span longest correct suggesting strong divergence of these variables to odd selection. Time taken to complete bet, Trail Making Test: B and time taken to complete Tower of Hannoi respectively had positive correlations with number of odds selected. Our results suggest that multiple domains of cognitive abilities and time taken to complete a bet are important for predicting gamblers at risk for poor decision making. It further suggests that use of single task for a particular cognitive domain could be sufficient in predicting persons at risk for decision making. Overall, our study suggests that risky decision making in real time sports betting could be predicted using fewer neuropsychological tasks measuring wider domains of brain behaviour and a non-cognitive measure.