By Annie KrallMedill Reports

Starbucks has learned how to make customers keep coming back for more thanks to their rewards program.

And theyre not alone.

Thousands and thousands of businesses use rewards programs to draw customers in and keep them loyal. But why is potentially getting the next stamp or another level up so enjoyable to us?

Talia Lerner, a neurobiologist at Northwestern Universitys Feinberg School of Medicine, and her team of researchers are trying to answer that question and many more. Using mice as test subjects they are analyzing the neurological pathways that make compulsive behaviors so difficult to stop, especially when it comes to alcoholism or obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).

Photo at top: Mice provide clues to how rewards programs keep customers coming back for more.(Annie Krall/Medill)

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Compulsive loyalty at Starbucks and clues to it from a neurology lab - Medill Reports: Chicago