There are 5 factors that influence people’s current or future intentions to gamble. The first is the alignment of gambling with culturally valued activities. The second is what people think they know about sports, self-declared wizards tend to bet more. Of course there’s also the marketing and the influence of friends and family.

But the 5th one is often forgotten: music.

If you are off to do some legal sports betting in New Jersey, or you visit an online casino, music will play a role.

Music can and will influence you

Muzak in the elevator and shopping malls, music in horror houses or music in casinos. It’s often something which musicians look down on. Strange, it’s precisely the music which creates a type of atmosphere which owners of said establishments want in order to bring visitors in the right mood, and it certainly is not something every musician is capable of producing. On the contrary.

A big supermarket will want you to feel at ease so you don’t leave the store too fast, that is if there is not a lot of people. When a supermarket has less people, you’ll notice that the background music will be quite slow. They want you to stay longer in the shop. But when it’s busy, they want you to move faster through the lanes, time is money in that case.

Hip clothing shops want you to feel young and energetic and will go for a more up tempo style of music, electronic that is. Coffee bars want you to create an atmosphere where people enjoy a talk, and their coffee. Jazz, blues, it all fits this economy really well. Horror houses want, well, that’s obvious, horror music. And casinos? They want music to let you feel more relaxed.

Not convinced?

Scientific research suggests music can influence us a lot, we talked about the shopping experience earlier, but there’s more, it can even result in a different outcome and healing process when you are ill or depressed. Some say that music can even create violence, but that’s bit to far fetched avoiding any guilt question. In the latter case, you can safely argue that people who are already prone to violence might be drawn to violent music. It however doesn’t mean that everybody who enjoys that kind of music has criminal tendencies. Having said that, in London and California, tests have shown that for instance classical music will lower the probability of more violent people to act violently.

But how does this work in casinos?

Besides mood and emotions, music can affect a few things which you ‘think’ you control. And that’s scientifically proven. For instance, it can and will influence how much money you spend or how productive you are at work. That’s not a surprise, music triggers certain hormones. And more specifically oxytocin and serotonin, which both are responsible for the following feelings: bonding, trust and intimacy. And guess where the first 2 come handy? Indeed, in a casino where you need to feel at home, safe and cherished.

Remember the shopping in an almost empty supermarket? Well, in casinos the choice of music is also double. When focussed on low-tempo music, the music is basically saying this: ‘Take your time, enjoy and don’t think about tomorrow’. As a result, a lot of people will be placing a larger number of bets compared to what you’d expect them to do because they play longer. If casinos go for faster music, people will show faster reactions, and you’ll see the number of quick bets going up.