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Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory

There seems to be no shortage of gambling and problem gambling typologies. At a closer look, however, previous research identified types of problem gamblers and not of problem gambling. While correct typologies of gamblers are important for developing treatment, they are less useful for harm prevent...

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Autor principal: Egerer, Michael
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10433772/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37601333
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fsoc.2023.1199474
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author Egerer, Michael
author_facet Egerer, Michael
author_sort Egerer, Michael
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description There seems to be no shortage of gambling and problem gambling typologies. At a closer look, however, previous research identified types of problem gamblers and not of problem gambling. While correct typologies of gamblers are important for developing treatment, they are less useful for harm prevention. The current study uses a system theoretical approach to investigate gambling communication in order to develop a genuine typology of gambling. Snowball sampling of Finnish gamblers resulted in 56 participants, who wrote 48 narratives about their ordinary gambling, 43 narratives about their most remarkable gambling event, and 28 about their worst gambling experience. The approach is informed by systems theory: communication on gambling is understood as a result of the reduction of contingency. Rather than focusing on the meaning of gambling or why people gamble, the analysis investigates what is included and what is excluded to make gambling discussable, i.e., the contextures of gambling. Economic and family/intimate contexture were the most prominent. The latter appeared most often in the most memorable gambling experiences. The economic contexture was more common in narrating ordinary and worst gambling situations. In all, four types of gambling could be identified: genuine monetary gambling, resonating monetary gambling, commensal gambling, and liminal gambling. When comparing the previously identified types of gamblers with the types of gambling discovered in the present study, it becomes obvious that a shift from the gamblers, their background, their personality, and their motives to the gambling activity provides novel insights. The constant appearance of the familial/intimate dimension in the narratives indicates that, beside the financial harms, societal harms also need to be treated as a category of harm in its own right, not just as a consequence of personality disorders, psychological distress, or social deprivation.
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spelling pubmed-104337722023-08-18 Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory Egerer, Michael Front Sociol Sociology There seems to be no shortage of gambling and problem gambling typologies. At a closer look, however, previous research identified types of problem gamblers and not of problem gambling. While correct typologies of gamblers are important for developing treatment, they are less useful for harm prevention. The current study uses a system theoretical approach to investigate gambling communication in order to develop a genuine typology of gambling. Snowball sampling of Finnish gamblers resulted in 56 participants, who wrote 48 narratives about their ordinary gambling, 43 narratives about their most remarkable gambling event, and 28 about their worst gambling experience. The approach is informed by systems theory: communication on gambling is understood as a result of the reduction of contingency. Rather than focusing on the meaning of gambling or why people gamble, the analysis investigates what is included and what is excluded to make gambling discussable, i.e., the contextures of gambling. Economic and family/intimate contexture were the most prominent. The latter appeared most often in the most memorable gambling experiences. The economic contexture was more common in narrating ordinary and worst gambling situations. In all, four types of gambling could be identified: genuine monetary gambling, resonating monetary gambling, commensal gambling, and liminal gambling. When comparing the previously identified types of gamblers with the types of gambling discovered in the present study, it becomes obvious that a shift from the gamblers, their background, their personality, and their motives to the gambling activity provides novel insights. The constant appearance of the familial/intimate dimension in the narratives indicates that, beside the financial harms, societal harms also need to be treated as a category of harm in its own right, not just as a consequence of personality disorders, psychological distress, or social deprivation. Frontiers Media S.A. 2023-08-02 /pmc/articles/PMC10433772/ /pubmed/37601333 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fsoc.2023.1199474 Text en Copyright © 2023 Egerer. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Sociology
Egerer, Michael
Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
title Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
title_full Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
title_fullStr Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
title_full_unstemmed Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
title_short Types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
title_sort types of gambling: finnish gambling narratives under the lens of systems theory
topic Sociology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10433772/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37601333
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fsoc.2023.1199474
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