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As the Seattle Seahawks and the Denver Broncos take to the field on Sunday, millions of people from around the world will be tuning in to watch who wins Super Bowl XLVIII. Many people may even want to place a bet or two on the game’s outcome. We know that research shows that 1% of U.S. adults have been diagnosed with a gambling disorder, while 2-3% of the population has a gambling problem.

If you’re one of those who likes to wager on sports and can do so without problems, you can establish your own limits and provide direction to others by developing a set of personal guidelines to determine whether, when and how much to gamble. Here are a few things to consider:

1. The decision to gamble is a personal choice. No one should feel pressure to gamble, or feel that he or she must gamble to be socially accepted.
2. Gambling is not essential for having a good time.Gambling should not be perceived as necessary for having fun and being with friends.
3. What constitutes an acceptable loss needs to be establishedbeforeyou place a bet.People should only gamble with the money they can afford to lose. For those who choose to gamble, it is essential to know when to stop.
4. Don’t borrow money to gamble.Borrowing money from a friend, relative or other source of funds with the intention of repaying with gambling winnings is too risky.
5. There are times when people should not gamble.Never gamble when under the legal gambling age; when it interferes with work or family responsibilities; when in recovery for addictions; when the form of gambling is illegal; when gambling is prohibited by an organizational policy; or when trying to make up for prior gambling losses (i.e. “chasing” losses).
6. There are certain high-risk situations when you should avoid gambling.Don’t gamble when you feel lonely, angry, depressed or under stress; when coping with the death of a loved one; to solve personal or family problems; or to impress others.
7. Excessive use of alcohol when gambling can be risky.Irresponsible alcohol use can affect a person’s judgment and interfere with the ability to control gambling and adhere to predetermined limits.

Keep gambling what it should be – entertainment. Know how to set limits and when to stop and enjoy the game!

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We are excited to announce the first NCRG webinar of 2014!

The NCRG’s Webinar Series will kick off Friday, January 31 at 2 p.m. with a free 90-minute event featuringKafui Dzirasa, M.D., Ph.D.,assistant professor in the departments of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, neurobiology, bioengineering at Duke University, and his colleagues Drs. Stephen Mague and Gretchen Sprow.

Often, individuals with a gambling disorder also struggle with other psychological difficulties. Research shows that a person with any other psychiatric disorder is 17.4 times more likely to develop a gambling disorder than those without such problems. How does the brain process these co-occurring disorders, and how does that influence how we diagnose and treat gambling disorder?

Titled“The Neurobiological Cocktail of Addiction, Gambling Disorders and Mood Disorders,”Drs. Dzirasa, Mague and Sprow will provide an overview of the many ways that treatment for gambling disorders is impacted by research on mood and anxiety disorders, drug and alcohol abuse. Because of this exciting topic and high demand, the NCRG is expanding this webinar session to 90 minutes for a more in-depth discussion on the issue.

TheNCRG Webinar Seriesprovides free, year-round educational opportunities designed to help individuals better understand and address critical issues related to gambling disorders and responsible gaming – without having to leave their own home or office.

These sessions are approved for 1.5 hours of continuing education by:

• NAADAC, the Association for Addiction Professionals (provider #737)
• The California Board of Behavioral Sciences (for MFT and LCSW licensure requirements in California) (Approval #PCE 4619)
• The National Board for Certified Counselors (provider #6474)

For those who attended, Dr. Dzirasa’s session was one of the highlights of the 2013 NCRG Conference on Gambling and Addiction. This webinar is not to be missed, soregister today!

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Yesterday, the NCRGannouncedthat its Board of Directors added two new members: Mark Lipparelli, former chairman of the Nevada State Gaming Control Board, and Christine Reilly, senior research director of the NCRG. Lipparelli was elected to the 12-member board and Reilly was appointed to serve as an officer of the board as secretary and treasurer. Christine Reilly replaces Judy Patterson following her departure from the NCRG.

The NCRG board of directors includes representatives from the gaming industry and the public health and regulatory communities. As the practical, hands-on management group of the organization, the board focuses on education and outreach program creation and implementation. For a complete list of board members,click here.

Mark Lipparelli

In 2012, Lipparelli completed a four-year term on the Nevada State Gaming Control Board, including the last two years as chairman. He left office to resume leadership positions at Gioco Ventures, LLC, a development stage technology company that he founded and previously at which he served as chief executive officer. Lipparelli is well known throughout the gaming industry, for his various management positions within Bally Technologies, Shuffle Master (now SHFL entertainment, Inc.) and Casino Data Systems.

The NCRG Chairman of the Board, Alan Feldman, said:

“We are thrilled to welcome Mark to the board; his deep knowledge and work in the regulatory space within the gaming industry is unparalleled. Mark’s expertise will propel the NCRG forward to help educate regulators about gambling disorders and help us develop resources to strategically address responsible gaming programs for online gamblers.”

Christine Reilly

As the senior research director of the NCRG, Reilly administers the organization’s research grant programs and coordinates educational activities such as the annual NCRG Conference on Gambling and Addiction and the EMERGE Training program (Executive, Management, and Employee Responsible Gaming Education). In this new role, Reilly will serve as a non-voting member of the NCRG Board of Directors. Previously, Reilly served as the executive director of the Institute for Research on Pathological Gambling and Related Disorders, from 2000 to 2009. She also was the first executive director of the NCRG from 1997 to 2000 and the executive director of the Missouri Humanities Council (the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities).

Feldman said:

“In seeking out the best person to fill Judy’s officer positions, the board unanimously agreed that Christine Reilly has the right depth of expertise, knowledge and background to take on and best represent the NCRG in those roles going forward. Christine was the NCRG’s first hire and has been with the organization from its very beginning. We are excited to work with Christine in this expanded role and welcome her continued and valuable contributions that will no doubt further the organization and its future initiatives.”

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Self-exclusion programs are a player-initiated, voluntary form of exclusion that provides gamblers with the opportunity to ban themselves from gambling venues as a tool to reduce or stop excessive gambling.New Jerseyjust announced that its self-exclusion program will be expanded to include gamblers who wager on the Internet. But what is known about the safety and effectiveness of self-exclusion? And, will it work for online gamblers?

Research on self-exclusion programs in land-based casinos in the United States and Canada has shown that this tool can be an effective and safe intervention. One Canadian study reported that self-excluders’ urge to gamble, the number of gambling problem symptoms and the intensity of negative consequences of gambling significantly decreased after six months (Ladouceur, Sylvain, & Gosselin, 2007).

A U.S. study revealed that most gamblers who signed up for a lifetime exclusion ban reduced their gambling and had significantly fewer gambling-related problems at follow up, with the rate of disordered gambling declining from 79 percent at enrollment to 15 percent at follow up (Nelson, Kleschinsky, LaBrie, Kaplan, & Shaffer, 2010). Self-excluders who participated in treatment for gambling problems or self-help groups after enrolling in the program had more positive outcomes than those who did not.

What’s especially intriguing about these findings is that 22 to 55 percent of the self-excluders enrolled in these studies entered casinos undetected, thereby breaching their agreement to stay away from the casino property (Ladouceur, Jacques, Giroux, Ferland, & Leblond, 2000; Ladouceur et al., 2007; Nelson et al., 2010). Yet, many of these self-excluders eventually reduced or eliminated their gambling problems. Researchers have conjectured that “it is possible that the act of self-excluding can reflect a motivation to stop gambling. In other words, those motivated to change their gambling behavior are likely more inclined to sign up for self-exclusion,” (Shaffer & Martin, 2011, p. 501). This could mean that the act of self-excluding is more important for the process of recovery than the threat of legal consequences (e.g., arrest for trespassing) common in the United States.

How do these findings apply to Internet gambling?

Many online gambling companies offer their subscribers’ the opportunity to self-limit their gambling by reducing the amount of money on deposit or closing their accounts altogether. Preliminary studies of these tools have indicated that self-limiters reduced their frequency of play, both the number of days on which they placed bets and the number of bets they placed per betting day (Nelson et al., 2008). Although the amount they wagered per bet did not change significantly, they did reduce the total amount they wagered. According to the authors of this study, these behavioral changes highlight the importance of activity level or involvement—not just money bet or lost—as a risk for gambling problems and as a target for change (Nelson et al., 2008).

For more about these and related studies, download volume 5 of the NCRG’s monograph series, titledEvaluating Self-Exclusion as an Intervention for Disordered Gambling. This compilation summarizes for a public audience the published research on self-exclusion.

References

Ladouceur, R., Jacques, C., Giroux, I., Ferland, F., & Leblond, J. (2000). Analysis of a casino’s self-exclusion program.Journal of Gambling Studies,16(4), 453–460. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14634308

Ladouceur, R., Sylvain, C., & Gosselin, P. (2007). Self-exclusion program: A longitudinal evaluation study.Journal of Gambling Studies,23(1), 85–94. doi:10.1007/s10899-006-9032-6

National Center for Responsible Gaming (Ed.). (2010).Evaluating Self-Exclusion as an Intervention for Disordered Gambling(Vols. 1-7, Vol. 5). Washington, DC: National Center for Responsible Gaming. Retrieved from http://www.ncrg.org/resources/monographs

Nelson, S. E., Kleschinsky, J. H., LaBrie, R. A., Kaplan, S., & Shaffer, H. J. (2010). One decade of self exclusion: Missouri casino self-excluders four to ten years after enrollment.Journal of Gambling Studies,26(1), 129–144. doi:10.1007/s10899-009-9157-5

Nelson, S. E., LaPlante, D. A., Peller, A. J., Schumann, A., LaBrie, R. A., & Shaffer, H. J. (2008). Real limits in the virtual world: Self-limiting behavior of internet gamblers.Journal of Gambling Studies,24(4), 463 – 477.

Shaffer, H. J., & Martin, R. (2011). Disordered gambling: etiology, trajectory, and clinical considerations.Annual Review of Clinical Psychology,7, 483–510. doi:10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-040510-143928

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Earlier this month, theNCRG announcedthat the organization has awarded $751,951 this year to support seven new research projects that will help improve methods of diagnosis, intervention, treatment and prevention of gambling disorders.

Here’s a list of the research projects that received funding from the NCRG:

Travel Grants

• “Do Pathological Gamblers Suffer from a Distorted Sensitivity to Reward?”– Guillaume Sescousse, Ph.D., of the Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior in the Netherlands, was awarded $1,500 to support his participation as a speaker at the 2013 annual conference of the Society for Neuroscience. Dr. Sescousse will present his research on the sensitivity to rewards among disordered gamblers.
• “The Atypical Antidepressant Mirtazapine Attenuates Gambling-like Behavior in Rodents”– Amanda Persons, Ph.D., of Rush University Medical Center, was awarded $1,500 in 2013 to support her participation in the poster session at the 2013 meeting of the College on Problems of Drug Dependence. Dr. Persons reported on research, funded by the NCRG, revealing that mirtazapine, an atypical antidepressant, reduced risk-taking behavior in rats and, therefore, holds promise as a treatment for gambling disorders.
• “Gambling and the Onset of Comorbid Mental Disorders: A Longitudinal Study Evaluating Severity and Specific Symptoms” –Iman Parhami, M.D., M.P.H., from the Delaware Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health was awarded $1,500 to attend the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry’s annual meeting. Dr. Parhami will give a presentation on a study of two waves of the longitudinal gambling data in the NESARC (National Epidemiological Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions) survey and a discussion about whether different levels of gambling behavior and gambling-related symptoms were associated with the onset of psychiatric disorders.

Seed Grants

• “How Skill Affects Gambler Responses to Wins and Losses”– Kyle Siler, Ph.D., of McMaster University, was awarded $27,536.75 to gauge the effects of wins and losses on subsequent play using a large dataset of online poker hands.
• “An Animal Model of Relapse to Pathological Gambling”– David Kearns, Ph.D., of American University, was awarded $28,750 to address the lack of knowledge about the causes of relapse of a gambling disorder by developing an animal model in which potential precipitators of relapse can be investigated.
• “The Effects of PTSD on Risky Decision-Making”– Caitlin A. Orsini, Ph.D., of the University of Florida, was awarded $28,750. Because Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) may alter decision-making capabilities, there is increasing interest in the relationship between PTSD and disordered gambling behavior. Dr. Orsini’s study will use a rodent model to determine whether elevated risk-taking is a pre-disposing factor to developing PTSD-like symptoms following trauma.

Early Stage Investigator Grant

• “Developing a Mouse Model of Pathological Gambling Using an Inducible and Tissue-specific Serotonin 1B Receptor Knock-out”– Katherine Nautiyal, Ph.D., of the Research Foundation for Mental Hygiene, Inc., was awarded $147,706 to develop mouse gambling behavioral models toward the goal of developing pharmacological treatments for gambling disorders.

Large Grants

• “Social Influences on the Development of Risky Choice”– Scott A. Huettel, Ph.D., of Duke University, was awarded $172,358 to study the emerging perspective that adolescence is associated with increased sensitivity to rewards, which places them particularly at risk for disorders including pathological responses to rewarding outcomes (e.g., gambling disorders).
• “Neural Correlates of Impulsivity and their Modulation by Dopamine in Problem/Pathological Gambling”– Andrew Kayser, M.D., Ph.D., of Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center at the University of California, San Francisco, was awarded $172,500 to evaluate a novel translational (and potentially therapeutic) approach for gambling disorders: inhibitors of the dopamine-degrading enzyme catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT).
• “Efficacy of a Brief Motivational Intervention Delivered via Smartphone and Short Messaging Service”– Matthew Martens, Ph.D., of the University of Missouri-Columbia, was awarded $171,350 to expand on his work from a previous NCRG grant. Dr. Martens will test the efficacy of a novel Brief Motivational Intervention (BMI) designed to reduce gambling among college students. This intervention will be delivered via smartphone devices (i.e., cell phones with comprehensive web applications) and short messaging service (SMS) technology.

To read more about this announcement,click here.For more information about the NCRG Grants Program,visit the NCRG website.

Stay connected with the NCRG here, and onFacebookandTwitter, for upcoming announcements on the NCRG’s 2014 funding opportunities.

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