Peter Attia· MD
some of the most addictive behaviors are variably reinforcing and i i sort of remember this example of why slot machines are you know particularly addictive because the pattern with which they produce a win is actually random and therefore you really don't know when it's going to come you know it's going to come you have to have belief that you know you'll see other people win and you've won in the past but that's somehow even more addictive whereas the cookie in theory is not variably reinforcing it's pretty much reinforcing the same way every time i mean presumably only subject to the tastiness of the cookie yeah so it's even more there's been tons of studies done on variable rewards and the basic answer is yes you're right variable rewards tend to accelerate or intensify behavior