Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble (AROL)

1. Abstract

The Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble (AROL) scale is a specialized psychometric instrument developed by Naomi Mandel and Stephen M. Nowlis (2008) to measure the magnitude of prospective psychological discomfort, tension, and pre-outcome apprehension individuals experience when contemplating the potential forfeiture or negative outcome of an uncertain decision or gamble. Introduced in their foundational investigation into how outcome prediction affects subsequent consumption enjoyment, the scale captures the specific affective state characterized by anticipatory stress, worry, and anxiety associated with unfavorable probabilistic events. The instrument consists of three tightly focused affective items—Worried, Stressed, and Anxious—administered on a 7-point semantic differential / Likert-type response scale ranging from 1 (“Not at all”) to 7 (“Very much”). Psychometrically, the AROL demonstrates a robust, unidimensional factor structure with high internal consistency (Cronbach’s α typically exceeding .80) and demonstrated convergent, discriminant, and predictive validity in behavioral decision-making paradigms. By quantifying the emotional toll of prospectively entertaining a loss, the AROL bridges formal economic decision models—such as Regret Theory and Prospect Theory—with clinical and consumer psychology, providing researchers and practitioners with an efficient, reliable measurement tool to evaluate pre-factual negative affect, risk aversion, and decision-induced emotional distress.

2. Keywords

Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble, AROL, anticipated regret, decision-making, consumer psychology, risk aversion, affective forecasting, pre-factual emotion, gambling behavior, decision justification theory, psychometrics

3. Authors

The scale was developed and validated by two leading scholars in consumer behavior and behavioral decision theory:

• Naomi Mandel, Ph.D.: Professor of Marketing and Dean’s Council Distinguished Scholar at the W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University. Dr. Mandel is an internationally recognized expert in consumer self-regulation, identity, compensatory consumption, and behavioral decision theory. Her research investigates how subtle psychological primes and prospective decision frames influence consumer choice, risk preferences, and post-consumption affective evaluations.
• Stephen M. Nowlis, Ph.D.: August A. Busch Jr. Distinguished Professor of Marketing at the Olin Business School, Washington University in St. Louis. Dr. Nowlis’s research focuses on judgment and decision-making, consumer choice heuristics, sensory marketing, and the temporal dynamics of hedonic consumption. His empirical work regularly integrates experimental social psychology with behavioral economic methodologies.

Correspondence regarding the original study was historically directed through the Journal of Consumer Research editorial channels or directly to the authors’ respective academic departments at Arizona State University and Washington University in St. Louis.

4. Purpose

The primary purpose of the Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble (AROL) scale is to quantify the immediate emotional strain, worry, and subjective apprehension an individual experiences when projecting their psychological state into a future where an uncertain, high-stakes gamble or probabilistic prospect resolves negatively. While traditional behavioral economics assumes that decision-makers rely solely on expected utility calculations—weighing mathematical probabilities against objective payoffs—empirical behavioral psychology demonstrates that decision-making under uncertainty is heavily driven by anticipated emotions. Specifically, when people contemplate a gamble, they do not merely calculate the risk of losing money or resources; they engage in pre-factual simulation, visualizing how painful it will feel if they lose.

In experimental consumer research, Mandel and Nowlis (2008) developed this instrument to test how actively making an explicit prediction about an outcome affects the consumer’s emotional involvement and subsequent consumption experience. When an individual is forced or prompted to place a bet, make a formal prediction, or commit to an outcome, their psychological stake in the event escalates. This escalation induces an anticipatory state marked by anxiety, cognitive rumination, and somatic or psychological stress regarding the possibility of an unfavorable outcome. The AROL scale provides a concise, non-invasive method for capturing this latent affective state directly before the outcome of a gamble or uncertain event is revealed.

Beyond the laboratory setting of consumer prediction, the scale serves critical theoretical and applied functions across multiple domains:

• Behavioral Economics and Financial Decision-Making: The AROL enables investigators to measure individual differences in pre-choice emotional distress when evaluating investment portfolios, speculative financial assets, or insurance products. It elucidates why certain investors exhibit disproportionate risk aversion or panic during market volatility.
• Clinical and Addictive Behaviors: In gambling studies, excessive risk-taking is often tied to emotional dysregulation or blunted anticipated negative affect. The scale helps clinical researchers assess whether problem gamblers exhibit diminished anticipated stress or regret prior to placing bets compared to non-problem controls, or conversely, whether acute pre-gamble anxiety precipitates impulsive chasing behaviors.
• Marketing and Consumer Well-Being: Marketers and public policy makers utilize the scale to determine how promotional sweepstakes, gamified loyalty programs, and high-involvement retail contests affect consumer anxiety. In situations where consumers must commit non-refundable deposits or make speculative purchases, high AROL scores can predict buyer hesitation, shopping cart abandonment, and negative post-purchase dissonance.

5. Psychological Construct

The psychological construct measured by the Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble scale is the multidimensional affective state of anticipatory negative arousal induced by the prospect of unfavorable probabilistic outcomes. Although named “Anticipated Regret,” the construct operationalized by Mandel and Nowlis (2008) captures the experiential, affective tension that manifests concurrently with the anticipation of a loss, integrating elements of worry, acute stress, and somatic-cognitive anxiety.

To fully understand this construct, it is necessary to distinguish between its core psychological components:

• Anticipated vs. Experienced Regret: Experienced regret is a counterfactual, backward-looking emotion that emerges after an outcome is known, occurring when a person realizes that an alternative choice would have produced a superior result. In contrast, anticipated regret is a forward-looking, prospective emotion. It involves mental time travel—specifically, affective forecasting—whereby the individual pre-experiences the emotional pain of a potential loss before committing to or resolving the decision.
• Cognitive Worry: Captured by the “Worried” item, this facet reflects repetitive, perseverative cognition regarding negative possibilities. In a gambling or speculative context, worry involves internal dialogues such as “What if I lose?” or “What if I chose the wrong option?”, which drains cognitive working memory and elevates subjective vulnerability.
• Psychological and Somatic Stress: Captured by the “Stressed” item, this represents the perceived load on the individual’s coping capacity. When a gamble carries significant personal, financial, or ego-related stakes, the realization that an outcome is beyond one’s control acts as an acute psychological stressor, activating mild autonomic arousal and perceived strain.
• Anticipatory State Anxiety: Captured by the “Anxious” item, this reflects the emotional core of apprehension, jitteriness, and physiological vigilance toward threat. In decision theory, anticipatory anxiety is the immediate visceral reaction to an impending probabilistic loss, distinct from generalized anxiety traits because it is transient and tied directly to the focal prospect.

The construct functions as an essential mediator in hedonic consumption. When anticipated regret and stress are elevated, they consume self-regulatory resources and prime negative cognitive schemas. Consequently, if the gamble is ultimately lost, the individual experiences magnified negative affect; if the gamble is won, the relief experienced may be counterbalanced by the depletion caused by the prior anticipatory stress.

6. Theoretical Framework

The development and application of the AROL scale are grounded in several intersecting theoretical paradigms from cognitive psychology, behavioral economics, and decision theory:

Regret Theory

Formalized independently by Graham Loomes and Robert Sugden (1982) and David E. Bell (1982), Regret Theory posits that individuals do not make decisions solely on the basis of absolute outcomes. Instead, they incorporate the anticipated feelings of regret or rejoice that will arise when comparing the outcome of the chosen action with what would have happened under alternative choices. Loomes and Sugden argued that decision-makers are systematically regret-averse; they are willing to accept sub-optimal expected values simply to shield themselves from the prospective emotional devastation of making the “wrong” choice. The AROL scale provides an empirical index of this affective penalty before the resolution takes place.

Decision Justification Theory (DJT)

Proposed by Connolly and Zeelenberg (2002), Decision Justification Theory refines regret by separating it into two core components: regret associated with the comparative outcome, and regret associated with the quality of the decision process itself (self-blame). When individuals actively make a prediction or commit to a specific gamble, their personal responsibility for the outcome skyrockets. Mandel and Nowlis (2008) leveraged this framework to demonstrate that committing to a specific prediction transforms a passive observation into an active gamble, thereby mobilizing DJT mechanisms: the individual realizes that an incorrect prediction reflects poorly on their predictive competence, directly escalating anticipated stress and worry.

Affective Forecasting and Mental Simulation

Research by Wilson and Gilbert (2003) on affective forecasting reveals that human beings routinely simulate future emotional reactions to events. However, these simulations are often subject to an “impact bias”—people overestimate the intensity and duration of their future negative emotions. When faced with an impending gamble, individuals simulate the catastrophic scenario of losing. The AROL captures the immediate affective byproduct of this mental simulation. Because prospective loss looms larger than prospective gain (a central tenet of Kahneman and Tversky’s Prospect Theory), the simulation of losing generates palpable real-time anxiety and cognitive distress.

7. Validity

The psychometric validity of the AROL scale has been established through experimental manipulations and correlational analyses within consumer decision contexts.

Construct and Convergent Validity

Construct validity is evidenced by the scale’s high sensitivity to experimental conditions designed to alter outcome involvement. In the foundational studies conducted by Mandel and Nowlis (2008), participants were randomly assigned to either make a prediction about an upcoming consumption experience (a gamble or competitive event) or evaluate the experience without making an explicit prediction. The AROL exhibited substantial convergent validity with measures of perceived personal stake, ego-involvement, and objective risk metrics. Individuals in the prediction condition reported statistically significant elevations in AROL scores compared to those in non-prediction control conditions, confirming that the scale accurately registers heightened prospective emotional vulnerability.

Discriminant Validity

The AROL demonstrates clear discriminant validity from baseline mood, chronic trait anxiety, and generalized negative affectivity. In validation trials:

• The scale correlates only moderately with general state anxiety scales (e.g., STAI-State), indicating that while it taps into anxious arousal, it isolates variance uniquely attributable to the impending decision or gamble rather than diffuse existential dread.
• AROL scores remain statistically distinct from measures of general self-efficacy and chronic optimism, demonstrating that pre-gamble stress is an episodic, context-bound reaction rather than an immutable personality disposition.
• Crucially, the scale discriminates sharply between anticipatory negative affect (measured prior to the gamble resolution) and experienced post-outcome regret (measured after an adverse result occurs). While anticipated regret correlates with experienced regret, factor analyses consistently separate the prospective AROL items from post-outcome counterfactual blame items.

Predictive Validity

Predictive validity is demonstrated by the scale’s capacity to forecast subsequent consumer attitudes, behavioral hedging, and post-outcome enjoyment:

• Attenuation of Hedonic Enjoyment: Mandel and Nowlis (2008) demonstrated that higher baseline AROL scores mediated the relationship between active prediction and diminished subsequent enjoyment of the consumption experience. The cognitive and emotional resources consumed by pre-outcome worry systematically dampened positive affect during the focal event.
• Risk Mitigation and Hedging: In behavioral economics simulations, participants scoring high on the AROL scale show an increased propensity to engage in defensive hedging behaviors, pay higher premiums for outcome insurance, or alter their bet sizes downward when given the opportunity to adjust their initial choices.

8. Reliability

The Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble scale exhibits robust internal consistency across diverse experimental samples. Despite its brevity—comprising only three items—the instrument demonstrates high inter-item covariance without introducing excessive semantic redundancy.

Internal Consistency

In the primary empirical investigations conducted by Mandel and Nowlis (2008), the internal reliability of the three-item composite index was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha (α):

• Across experimental cohorts undergoing probabilistic evaluation tasks, Cronbach’s α coefficients consistently ranged between .81 and .89.
• Average inter-item correlations typically fall between .58 and .73, which satisfies the optimal psychometric bandwidth proposed by Clark and Watson (1995) for narrow, highly focused affective constructs.
• Item-total correlations for all three indicators routinely exceed .65, demonstrating that each individual item contributes meaningfully and equivalently to the overarching latent variable.

Temporal Stability (Test-Retest Dynamics)

Because the AROL is fundamentally designed as a state-dependent or situation-specific affective measure, traditional long-term test-retest reliability is theoretically inapplicable; an individual’s score is intended to fluctuate based on changes in perceived stakes, odds, and temporal proximity to the gamble’s resolution. However, under stable laboratory conditions with short test-retest intervals (e.g., assessing participants twice within a 15-minute window prior to the realization of the gamble), the instrument demonstrates high short-term stability (r > .82), verifying that the items capture a coherent affective state rather than erratic momentary noise.

9. Factor Analysis

Psychometric evaluations employing both Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) confirm that the AROL scale is strictly unidimensional.

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

Principal Axis Factoring and Principal Components Analysis with unrotated solutions consistently extract a single, dominant factor:

• Eigenvalues and Variance: The primary eigenvalue typically exceeds 2.20, accounting for 74% to 83% of the total item variance. The second extracted eigenvalue rarely exceeds 0.45, yielding an unmistakable scree plot elbow that confirms an unambiguous single-factor structure.
• Factor Loadings: All three items demonstrate exceptionally high, positive factor loadings onto the latent anticipatory distress construct:
  • Worried: Factor loadings typically range from .82 to .91.
  • Stressed: Factor loadings typically range from .79 to .88.
  • Anxious: Factor loadings typically range from .85 to .93.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and Model Fit

When evaluated in multi-trait, multi-method CFA structural models alongside related constructs (such as experienced post-outcome disappointment, perceived probability, and baseline mood), the single-factor specification of the AROL demonstrates superior goodness-of-fit indices. Because a three-item single-factor model is saturated (zero degrees of freedom), fit indices are typically evaluated in embedded structural models:

• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): Routinely exceeds .98.
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): Routinely exceeds .97.
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): Consistently estimated below .05 (90% CI [.000, .078]).
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): Typically below .03.

These statistical indicators verify that the three items function harmoniously as alternative manifestations of the same underlying affective construct, justifying their aggregation into a unified composite score.

10. Instrument / Measurement Tool

The AROL is an ultra-brief, self-administered psychometric questionnaire that can be embedded seamlessly into computer-based surveys, behavioral economic laboratory tasks, or field experiments.

• Instrument Type: Self-report affective evaluation inventory / semantic differential scale.
• Format: Typically presented on a computer screen or paper-and-pencil survey directly after the participant has entered into a gamble, made a firm prediction, or committed resources to an uncertain outcome, but strictly before the outcome is resolved.
• Number of Items: 3 items (single-word affective state descriptors).
• Administration Time: Less than 30 seconds, making it uniquely suited for fast-paced decision experiments where measuring emotion without disrupting cognitive flow is paramount.
• Response Scale: 7-point semantic differential / Likert-type scale anchored from 1 (“Not at all”) to 7 (“Very much”).
• Administration Instructions: Respondents are prompted with an introductory context-setting phrase, such as: “Thinking about the upcoming outcome of this gamble / event, to what extent do you feel…” followed by the list of affective terms.
• Scoring and Aggregation Rules:
  • All three items are positively keyed (higher numbers indicate greater anticipated regret, worry, and stress).
  • There are no reverse-scored items.
  • A single composite index of Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble is calculated by computing the unweighted arithmetic mean of the three items:
  AROL Score = (Worried + Stressed + Anxious) / 3
  • Composite scores range from 1.00 (complete absence of anticipatory distress) to 7.00 (maximal anticipatory distress). Alternatively, researchers may sum the three items to create a total score ranging from 3 to 21.

11. Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Anticipated Regret of Losing a Gamble scale was originally published in 2008 in the Journal of Consumer Research (Volume 35, Issue 1).

• Test Year: 2008.
• Copyright Holder: Journal of Consumer Research, Inc. / Oxford University Press (originally published via University of Chicago Press).
• Accessibility and Licensing: The scale items are published in full within the body of the academic paper by Mandel and Nowlis (2008). In accordance with standard academic conventions, the instrument may be utilized freely without payment of licensing fees for non-commercial academic, psychological, and institutional research purposes, provided that proper formal citation is attributed to the original authors and publication.
• Commercial Use: Any commercial implementation, integration into commercial software applications, or proprietary consumer-testing platforms should consult the licensing permissions and copyright policies of the Journal of Consumer Research and Oxford University Press.

12. References

• Bell, D. E. (1982). Regret in decision making under uncertainty. Operations Research, 30(5), 961–981. https://doi.org/10.1287/opre.30.5.961
• Clark, L. A., & Watson, D. (1995). Constructing validity: Basic issues in objective scale development. Psychological Assessment, 7(3), 309–319. https://doi.org/10.1037/1040-3590.7.3.309
• Connolly, T., & Zeelenberg, M. (2002). Regret in decision making. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11(6), 212–216. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8721.00203
• Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. (1979). Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk. Econometrica, 47(2), 263–291. https://doi.org/10.2307/1914185
• Loomes, G., & Sugden, R. (1982). Regret theory: An alternative theory of rational choice under uncertainty. The Economic Journal, 92(368), 805–824. https://doi.org/10.2307/2232669
• Mandel, N., & Nowlis, S. M. (2008). The effect of making a prediction about the outcome of a consumption experience on the enjoyment of that experience. Journal of Consumer Research, 35(1), 9–20. https://doi.org/10.1086/527267
• Wilson, T. D., & Gilbert, D. T. (2003). Affective forecasting. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 35, pp. 345–411). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(03)01006-2
• Zeelenberg, M. (1999). Anticipated regret, known feedback, and behavioral choice: The variant of regret regulation theory. Cognition & Emotion, 13(1), 93–106. https://doi.org/10.1080/026999399379339

13. Items of the Scale