Using the game can’t stop to inform the novel behavioural state of near-loss.

(Sackson, 1980) as a playful paradigm to study the behavioural consequences of near-misses compared to full-wins, playing against opponents who are either cautious or reckless. Each turn, players are given the option to either continue rolling dice (but risk losing their progress) or stop (thereby saving their progress). Our data showed that previous outcome and opponency interacted such that participants produced more stop behaviour against the cautious opponent relative to the reckless opponent but only when the previous outcome was a near-loss. Imitation of an opponent's behaviour is discussed both in reference to its potential automaticity and social contingencies, whereas stopping behaviour is considered a possibly erroneous perception of the interdependence between dice throws. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).