Abstract

Poker is a game of skill and chance involving economic decision-making under uncertainty. It is also a complex but well-defined real-world environment with a clear rule-structure. As such, poker has strong potential as a model system for studying high-stakes, high-risk expert performance. Poker has been increasingly used as a tool to study decision-making and learning, as well as emotion self-regulation. In this review, we discuss how these studies have begun to inform us about the interaction between emotions and technical skill, and how expertise develops and depends on these two factors. Expertise in poker critically requires both mastery of the technical aspects of the game, and proficiency in emotion regulation; poker thus offers a good environment for studying these skills in controlled experimental settings of high external validity.We conclude by suggesting ideas for future research on expertise, with new insights provided by poker.
Original languageEnglish
JournalJournal of expertise
Volume3
Issue number2
Pages (from-to)66-87
Number of pages22
ISSN2573-2773
Publication statusPublished - Jun 2020
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Fields of Science

  • 6162 Cognitive science

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