Do you have a “Roll Up the Rim” Addiction?

The best thing about living in Canada during the cold winter days is likely the Roll Up the Rim to Win contest put on by Tim Hortons every year in February. In addition to satisfying our caffeine cravings, customers get the chance to roll up our rims in hopes of winning a free donut or that new car we don’t really need. Because of this, we often find ourselves visiting the fast food chain more often than say Starbucks (granted Timmies is much cheaper). But is this feeding into an addiction not unlike a gambling addiction?

When we buy a hot beverage from Tim Hortons, we exhibit patterns of beliefs like those who frequent casinos. Customers show the gambler’s fallacy when they believe that because they have not been successful for so many times, they will be less likely to read “PLEASE PLAY AGAIN” in the future. They continue to participate by buying more beverages because they HAVE to win this time. However, the odds of winning do not change with every trial. They remain the same every time you play but gamblers are often more optimistic about their chances the more they try. Participants also show signs of the illusion of control when they order the large coffee instead of the medium even if they cannot handle all of the caffeine. But because the odds of winning are greater, participants believe that they can “exert skill over an outcome that is actually defined by chance (Clark, 2007).”

Brain imaging techniques have been utilized during gambling games to look at which regions are activated when humans receive monetary rewards. Researchers have found that the reward centre that is activated when we eat or participate in sexual activity is also activated when we gamble. Increased dopamine activity is also correlated with gambling. If participation in the Roll Up the Rim contest is anything like gambling, then we should expect to see similar areas of activation and similar levels of dopamine activity elevation when participants see that they have won a prize.

Now wouldn’t it be interesting if we got to see our brains every time we purchase a Roll Up the Rim beverage? How much less (or more) frequently would we step inside the restaurant if we saw our reward centres light up so often?