Hot Hand Fallacy
generalThe belief that a person who has experienced success has a greater chance of further success in additional attempts.
Key Takeaways
- 1The hot hand feels real but is mostly a cognitive illusion
- 2In games of chance, it definitively doesn't exist
- 3In sports, the effect is much smaller than people think
- 4Never change your bet sizing based on streaks
What is the Hot Hand Fallacy?
The Hot Hand Fallacy is the belief that someone who has been successful recently is more likely to continue being successful. While "momentum" feels real, in many contexts it's a cognitive illusion.
The Original Study
In 1985, Gilovich, Vallone, and Tversky studied basketball shooting and found no evidence that players were more likely to make a shot after making previous shots. The "hot hand" appeared to be a perception, not a reality.
The Plot Twist
More recent research (2018) using larger datasets found that a small hot hand effect may exist in some sports contexts — but it's much smaller than people perceive. The bias isn't that the hot hand doesn't exist at all, but that people dramatically overestimate its magnitude.
In Gambling
For casino games and lottery, the hot hand is definitively a fallacy:
- Dice, cards, and RNG have no memory
- A "hot" slot machine is not more likely to pay out
- A "hot" lottery number is not more likely to be drawn
The Takeaway
In sports with human performance, tiny momentum effects may exist. In games of pure chance, they absolutely do not. Never let a "hot streak" change your bet sizing or strategy.