Hot Hand Effect

Definition

Many sports fans, commentators, players, and even coaches share a belief that a particular player can for some period of time have the hot hand; that is, be “in the zone,” “on a roll,” “unstoppable,” or “playing their A-game.” The hot hand effect refers to the tendency for people to expect streaks in sports performance to continue. For example, people believe that a basketball player's chances of making a shot are higher if the player had just made the previous shots, and gamblers believe in bettors being “on fire” and having lucky winning streaks.

The hot hand effect is typically discussed in two ways. In the basketball-shooting example, the hot hand effect pertains to the belief that a hot player has an increased likelihood of making the next shot he or she takes. Recently, the term hot hand effect has been used more generally to refer to when people expect streaks to continue for any sequence of events with just two outcomes (e.g., hits vs. misses in basketball shooting, or wins vs. losses in roulette betting).

It is important to distinguish between two terms: the hot hand effect and the hot hand (also sometimes labeled positive recency). The former refers to people's beliefs about hot hand performances, while [Page 449]the latter refers to the actual occurrence of hot streaks in sports performances.

Evidence

Although belief in the hot hand in basketball is quite common, analyses of the shooting statistics of professional basketball players playing for the Philadelphia 76ers, New Jersey Nets, New York Knicks, and the Boston Celtics showed that, in fact, basketball players do not get the hot hand. The disparity between people's perceptions of streaks and the existence of actual streaks was confirmed with a controlled experiment in which varsity college basketball players made free throws. Before each shot, both the players and observers predicted the outcome of the attempt. Both players and observers believed that some players were hot while shooting free throws, but only 1 out of the 26 players actually showed positive dependencies between shots and an unusual number of streaks.

Psychologists and statisticians have examined athletic performances from a variety of sports other than basketball to seek evidence for streaky performances. They have analyzed playing records and tested for one or more of the following indicators of the hot hand: positive dependencies, unusually long streaks, or an unusually high number of streaks. In addition to basketball shooting, researchers have failed to document evidence for the hot hand in baseball hitting and scoring, professional golf putting, volleyball scoring, and baseball and basketball game winning.

Altogether, the bulk of research findings indicate that actual hot (and cold) playing streaks are more rare in sports than people believe. However, some evidence for streaky performances was found in bowling, hockey goaltending, billiards, horseshoes, tennis, darts, and amateur golf putting in a laboratory setting. This seems to suggest that nonreactive, turn-based, uniform, individual sports are more likely to yield evidence of hot hand performances than are more reactive team sports events that involve more external and situational factors.

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