Hot Streaks in Sports is a Myth
FILED UNDER: News. Science, Sports.
As a Laker fan (don't hate), I've seen Kobe go from ice-cold to red-hot more times than I can count. All of us have no doubt seen our favorite player enter some ethereal state of mind that finds them incapable of missing a basket. Well, research reveals that the notion of a hot-streak is nothing more than an illusion.
The illusory nature of basketball shooting streaks was first demonstrated by Amos Tversky and Thomas Gilovich, a psychologist at Cornell. They began the investigation by sifting through years of Philadelphia 76er statistics. They looked at every single shot taken by ever single player, and recorded whether or not that shot had been preceded by a string of hits or misses. If "the hot hand" was a real phenomenon, then players should have a higher field goal percentage after making several previous shots. The streak should elevate their game.
So what did the scientists find? There was absolutely no evidence of "the hot hand". A player's chance of making a shot was not affected by whether or not their previous shots had gone in. Each field goal attempt was its own independent event. The short runs experienced by the 76ers were no different than the short runs that naturally emerge from any random process. Taking a jumper was like flipping a coin. The streaks were a figment of our imagination.
Damn scientists have to ruin everything!
Read More (Source: Science Blog - Cortex)
