An investigation into pathological gambling

Pathological gambling is a psychiatric disorder characterised, according to the international diagnostic classification DSM-IV, by persistent, recurrent and maladaptive gambling behaviour which disrupts the subject's personal, family and working life. We report here a study carried out in 1998 with the aim of discovering the gambling behaviour of the overall resident population of Ticino (the Italian-speaking Swiss canton) in general, and of the clients of the casinos in Lugano and Locarno in particular, together with the respective prevalence rates and characteristics of problem and pathological gamblers, and associated risk factors. The study involved telephone interviews with a representative sample of 1044 persons selected for gender, age and profession drawn from the entire population over the age of 18, and face-to-face interviews with a proportional sample of 1000 casino clients. The interview questionnaire contained socio-demo-',graphic items, a series of questions relating to all types of gambling behaviour, the internationally validated SOGS scale, which is derived from the DSM-111 diagnostic criteria, and three questions taken from the Gamblers Anonymous questionnaire. Analysis of the results of the study shows that half of the adult population of Ticino gamble at least once: a year, notably on the state Lottery (47%), and 6% visited a casino in the year prior to the survey. White %: 98.8% of Ticino residents do not appear to have gambling problems, 0.6% are likely to be problem gamblers and another 6% pathological gamblers (making a total of around 3,000 problem and pathological gamblers among the resident adult population of the canton). This prevalence rate is at the lower bound of those observed in studies conducted in other countries. Among clients of the two casinos, 15% are identifiable as problem gamblers and 11% as pathological gamblers. 30% are frequent gamblers (at least one visit every week). The majority of clients play the slot machines, although problem and pathological gamblers prefer video poker. As regards the risk of becoming a problem or pathological gambler, of all socio-demographic variables the most relevant are gender and educational level: the risk is twice as great for men, and increases by 1.4% with every decrease in educational level (5 levels in all). (Author' s abstract)