Alumni from I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!, including Kings and Queen of the Jungle Phil Tufnell, Joe Swash and Vicky Pattison, attended tombola’s ‘Critter Challenge’ event in London to celebrate the bingo brand’s seventh year sponsoring the show and to relive their days in the jungle by putting themselves through a terrifying new trial.
The data, which was collected via polygraph as the celebs took on the challenge and were asked various fear-provoking questions, showed us how each of them reacted to the stimuli, with peak responses occurring when asked to put their hand into the unknown of the mystery box of the tombola Critter Challenge.
Vicky Pattison had a 54% increase from her base when asked if she had a fear of spiders. Meanwhile, twenty years after his I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! win, Phil Tufnell remained calm, with his sweat gland activity and blood pressure only raising 9%. However, Phil Tufnell had a 61% increase in his blood pressure when asked if he had a fear of spiders.
Vicky also had a similarly strong reaction to the idea of a spider crawling on her face, with a 20% increase in sweat gland activity. Last year’s contestant Scarlette Douglas only had a 1% increase, while Joe Swash a 5% increase.
As we expected, the greatest base rate change for everyone across the board was the moment they put their hand into the unknown and took on the Critter Challenge – this is where we saw 100% increases in sweat gland activity and blood pressure. And a few screams to go along with it.
Hosted by tombola, Britain’s biggest bingo site, the Critter Challenge event also celebrated the launch of the new ‘Bug Match’ game, which is free to play and offers players the chance to win up to £1,000. Users can play the game throughout the duration of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here!, where there are 500,000 prizes to be won.
Phil, Joe and Vicky were also joined by former campmate Scarlette Douglas, alongside influencers such as Below Deck’s Daisy Kelliher, at the VIP event at Outernet, London. They all bravely plunged their hands into a specially designed tombola ‘mystery box’, filled with a variety of spine-tingling bugs, or so they thought. The boxes were powered by unique augmented reality coupled with an immersive sensory experience to make it seem like their hands were covered in bugs.
Recent consumer research by tombola also discovered over three quarters of the UK (86%) claim to be scared of bugs with tarantulas (32%), wasps (27%) and cockroaches (26%) coming in as the top three most feared bugs.
Phil Tufnell, ex I’m A Celeb… contestant and Critter Challenge participant added: “We’re so excited that tombola is sponsoring I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! for the seventh year, but I’ll tell you something, the Critter Challenge was a proper spectacle. Being hooked up to a polygraph whilst having your hand in a box full of bugs isn’t your normal Monday night.”
James Boord, Marketing Director at tombola said: “We are so excited to be sponsoring I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! for the seventh year and to be getting our Bug Match mobile game out into the wild. It was great to celebrate by hosting an event that goes beyond the ordinary and sees whether ex-contestants can still handle the pressure of a challenge like this. Fair to say, we raised some heartrates!”
