The Logical Probability Behind Lotteries and Raffles: Chance and Cognitive Bias from a Data Science Perspective

The entertainment activities such as lotteries and raffles are popular among people, but the cognitive bias of people may result in fluke mentality, leading to social issues like debts, problem gambling and behavioral addiction. This essay focuses on the logic of probabilities behind lotteries and raffles, talking about how data science deal with the chances and misconceptions of them. Our topics include probability, independent events, the expected value and so on. The method is based on overview analysis of previous resources. The study suggests that the huge prize money in lottery does not necessarily equate to high average returns, and past outcomes in independent random events do not affect future probabilities, When faced with low probability and high return events, people's judgments are often influenced by subjective weights and intuition, forming a sense of opportunity illusion. The conclusion of this study indicates that data science can help the public correct cognitive biases, enhance probability awareness and rational decision-making ability through objective probability, expected value, natural frequency, and large sample data analysis.