It has been almost 5,000 days since pathological action gambler
John C., a member of Gamblers Anonymous, has placed a bet. That is
just over 12 years of battling a disease that he said tyrannized
him for 30 years, forcing him to live a double life as the family
man he wanted to be and the pathological gambler he was.
“It progressed to the point where I owed money to everyone
I had ever met,” he said to an audience of 75 people at the
James Bridges Theater while pouring out his life story as a
cautionary tale before the screening of “Dreamland” on
Nov. 8.
The documentary, put on by the Friends of the Semel Institute
for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, portrays the ugly, unromantic
side of gambling. It profiles different individuals, painting a
picture of problem gambling’s destructive force in society
and its many manifestations.
The behavioral addiction, which experts say has the power of a
substance addiction, was termed pathological gambling in 1980 when
the American Psychiatric Association first recognized it as a
full-fledged mental disorder.
FLASH GRAPHIC Click
here to see a graphic on the three archetypes of problem
gamblers.
According to the National Council on Problem Gambling, it is a
progressive illness characterized by continuous losses of control
and preoccupation with when, where and how to gamble next, and it
can manifest itself in multiple forms.
The three most prominent faces of gambling are action gambling,
escape gambling and obsessive-compulsive gambling, said Timothy
Fong, a clinician and co-director of the UCLA Gambling Studies
Program.
Fong has had personal experience with gambling ““ he was
raised in a family that not only accepted gambling, but engaged in
gambling as a family activity.
“Over the holidays we would play Mahjong and other
gambling games for money with the whole family, aunts and
uncles,” Fong said.
Mahjong is a game for four players that originated in China and
requires skill, strategy, intelligence, calculation and luck, Fong
said. It is similar to poker and is a common game in Asian
countries. For Fong’s family, gambling was a pastime.
Fong describes John C. as most closely associated with the
action gambling archetype.
Action gambling is characterized by the need to reach a euphoric
state of mind through the thrill of playing and betting. Action
gamblers are attracted to sports betting and games such as poker
partially because they enjoy the social setting and crave
recognition, which contrasts with the escape gamblers’
solitary approach and preference for slot machine games and video
poker, Fong said.
Action gamblers experience a pleasurable rush, getting physical
sensations that can include a rapid heart rate, sweaty palms or
nausea, according to the UCLA Gambling Studies Program Web
site.
Another major player is the escape gambler.
They are usually women who have suffered traumatic life
experiences, abuse or depression and cannot deal with their
problems in a healthy way, according to the National Council on
Problem Gambling and its affiliated states.
But recent studies have displayed increasing numbers of men in
this category, while more women are being classified into the
action gambling subtype.
Studies have shown that escape gamblers crave a numbing,
narcotic-like hypnotic sensation in contrast to the action
gamblers’ endorphin-packed adrenaline rush.
The third type is the obsessive-compulsive gambler, who wants to
stop but impulsively gambles to suppress anxiety. Though this
gambler tries desperately to fight the urge to gamble, studies have
shown that giving in is bitter but subconsciously sweet since
pleasure is experienced in the form of relief, according to the
UCLA Gambling Studies Program.
“These gamblers say things like, “˜I have to gamble
to get out of debt,'” Fong said.
Obsessive-compulsive gamblers can also be binge gamblers, who go
long periods of time without gambling and then burst, according to
the UCLA Gambling Studies Program Web site. This is similar to the
binge phase of a compulsive eater, Fong said.
All types harbor the belief that there will be the big win that
is going to solve all their problems, he said.
This delusional mind-set is what keeps the pathological gambler
going because the big win never comes. But even a big win would not
cure a pathological gambler, added Fong. He recently provided
expert testimony in a case involving a pathological gambler who
robbed more than $1,000 from a bank, then gambled it all away.
When
someone has progressed into addiction, it is no longer about the
money but about attaining the means to continue gambling, Fong
said.
“Like every addiction, gambling requires exposure,”
Fong said. The growing availability of gambling in Los Angeles
inspired Fong to conduct research about it in 1998 after he read an
article in the Los Angeles Times about gambling addiction.
He said he noticed that no academic institutions existed to
educate people about the influence an increase in gambling could
have on society, nor was there any treatment or research in how
this disorder affected the brain. The legalized gaming industry
alone, Fong said, grew from $2.5 billion in 1997 to $13 billion in
2003.
Gambling is one of the only addictions that can be hidden easily
and portrayed as socially acceptable until finances begin to fall
into complete disarray. The three types of problem gambling are not
set in stone, Fong said, they are more like guidelines with gray
areas in between.
For example, Fong said that each of the three archetypes can
potentially produce uncontrollable anxiety when the lies have piled
up along with debt. Anxiety is not limited to the
obsessive-compulsive gambler. In addition, according to the
National Council on Problem Gambling, new types are emerging such
as the Internet and stock-market problem gamblers.
These archetypes are like the different faces of a die ““
each side is different yet equally significant, and part of the
same larger structure of the problem of the pathological
gambler.
Fong describes John C. as most closely associated with the
action gambling archetype.
Action gambling is characterized by the need to reach a euphoric
state of mind through the thrill of playing and betting. Action
gamblers are attracted to sports betting and games such as poker
partially because they enjoy the social setting and crave
recognition, which contrasts with the escape gamblers’
solitary approach and preference for slot machine games and video
poker, Fong said.
Action gamblers experience a pleasurable rush, getting physical
sensations that can include a rapid heart rate, sweaty palms or
nausea, according to the UCLA Gambling Studies Program Web
site.
Another major player is the escape gambler.
They are usually women who have suffered traumatic life
experiences, abuse or depression and cannot deal with their
problems in a healthy way, according to the National Council on
Problem Gambling and its affiliated states.
But recent studies have displayed increasing numbers of men in
this category, while more women are being classified into the
action gambling subtype.
Studies have shown that escape gamblers crave a numbing,
narcotic-like hypnotic sensation in contrast to the action
gamblers’ endorphin-packed adrenaline rush.
The third type is the obsessive-compulsive gambler, who wants to
stop but impulsively gambles to suppress anxiety. Though this
gambler tries desperately to fight the urge to gamble, studies have
shown that giving in is bitter but subconsciously sweet since
pleasure is experienced in the form of relief, according to the
UCLA Gambling Studies Program.
“These gamblers say things like, “˜I have to gamble
to get out of debt,'” Fong said.
Obsessive-compulsive gamblers can also be binge gamblers, who go
long periods of time without gambling and then burst, according to
the UCLA Gambling Studies Program Web site. This is similar to the
binge phase of a compulsive eater, Fong said.
All types harbor the belief that there will be the big win that
is going to solve all their problems, he said.
This delusional mind-set is what keeps the pathological gambler
going because the big win never comes. But even a big win would not
cure a pathological gambler, added Fong. He recently provided
expert testimony in a case involving a pathological gambler who
robbed more than $1,000 from a bank, then gambled it all away.
When someone has progressed into addiction, it is no longer
about the money but about attaining the means to continue gambling,
Fong said.
“Like every addiction, gambling requires exposure,”
Fong said. The growing availability of gambling in Los Angeles
inspired Fong to conduct research about it in 1998 after he read an
article in the Los Angeles Times about gambling addiction.
He said he noticed that no academic institutions existed to
educate people about the influence an increase in gambling could
have on society, nor was there any treatment or research in how
this disorder affected the brain. The legalized gaming industry
alone, Fong said, grew from $2.5 billion in 1997 to $13 billion in
2003.
Gambling is one of the only addictions that can be hidden easily
and portrayed as socially acceptable until finances begin to fall
into complete disarray. The three types of problem gambling are not
set in stone, Fong said, they are more like guidelines with gray
areas in between.
For example, Fong said that each of the three archetypes can
potentially produce uncontrollable anxiety when the lies have piled
up along with debt. Anxiety is not limited to the
obsessive-compulsive gambler. In addition, according to the
National Council on Problem Gambling, new types are emerging such
as the Internet and stock-market problem gamblers.
These archetypes are like the different faces of a die ““
each side is different yet equally significant, and part of the
same larger structure of the problem of the pathological
gambler.