Abstract
The main purpose of this study was to investigate the interplay of functional and dysfunctional impulsivity, delay discounting, time perspective, and emotional negative states on gambling severity in Italian adolescents. A second aim of the study was to analyze the developmental trajectories of gambling involvement, functional and dysfunctional impulsivity, delay discounting, consideration of future consequences, and negative affectivity in a cross-sectional perspective. One thousand and ten Italian adolescents aging between 12 and 19 years were administered the South Oaks Gambling Screen Revised for Adolescents (SOGS-RA), the Functional and Dysfunctional Impulsivity Scale (FDIS), the Monetary Choice Questionnaire (MCQ), the Consideration of Future Consequences Scale (CFC-14), and the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21). Data analyses were conducted using correlational analysis, Chi-square test, analysis of variance, and hierarchical regression analysis. Results indicated that, relative to non-gamblers and non-problem gamblers, at-risk and problem gamblers showed higher levels of impulsivity, steeper delay discounting, shorter time horizon, and reported experiencing significantly higher levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. Results of hierarchical regression analysis, with SOGS-RA scores as the dependent variable, and gender, age, FDIS, MCQ, CFC-14, and DASS-21 scores as independent variables, indicated that, along with gender and age, low scores of future orientation and high scores of dysfunctional impulsivity, depression, anxiety, present orientation, and delay discounting significantly predicted gambling severity. These findings provide further evidence that the higher the gambling involvement, the greater the tendency to devalue delayed rewards and to focus on the immediate consequences of one's behavior. Interestingly, for the first time these results reveal an association between gambling severity and both dysfunctional impulsivity and negative affective states across adolescence. Finally, results of cross-sectional analyses suggest that gambling severity contributes more than age in shaping the developmental trajectories of functional and dysfunctional impulsivity, delay discounting, time perspective, and negative affective states.
Highlights
In the last decades gambling addiction has become a serious public health issue
Adolescent participation in gambling activities is of particular concern, given that some risk factors for disordered gambling are so manifest during adolescence, that adolescence by itself may be regarded as a risk factor for the onset and the development of problematic gambling (Messerlian et al, 2004, 2005; van den Bos et al, 2013)
One thousand and ten Italian students (47,5% males) aged between 12 and 19 years (Mean age = 15.37 years; SD = 2.05) attending public middle (14.2%) or high school (58.4% lyceum and 27.4% technical and trade school) in Southern Italy took part in the study. They were administered the South Oaks Gambling Screen Revised for Adolescents (Winters et al, 1993, 1995; Italian version: Colasante et al, 2013; SOGSRA), the Functional and Dysfunctional Impulsivity Scale (FDIS; Dickman, 1990), the Monetary Choice Questionnaire (Kirby and Marakovic, 1996; Kirby et al, 1999; MCQ), the Consideration of Future Consequences Scale (Joireman et al, 2012; Italian validation: Nigro et al, 2016; CFC-14), and the Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scales-21 (Lovibond and Lovibond, 1995; Italian validation: Bottesi et al, 2015; DASS-21)
Summary
In the last decades gambling addiction has become a serious public health issue. Mainly due to the increasing availability of online gambling and the similarity between modern forms of gambling and other familiar technology-based games, the prevalence of disordered gambling will predictably increase further in the near future (Donati et al, 2013; McCormack et al, 2014; Delfabbro et al, 2016). Gainsbury et al (2016b) have demonstrated that for a large proportion of at-risk and problem gamblers the exposure and the engagement with social media advertisements for gambling worsened their problems (see Gainsbury et al, 2016a). In this backdrop, adolescent participation in gambling activities is of particular concern, given that some risk factors for disordered gambling are so manifest during adolescence, that adolescence by itself may be regarded as a risk factor for the onset and the development of problematic gambling (Messerlian et al, 2004, 2005; van den Bos et al, 2013). In spite of gambling is an illegal activity in Italy under the age of 18, some studies on Italian adolescents have found that 16–17% of high school students were at-risk of developing problem gambling, and 7–8% problem gamblers (Chiesi et al, 2013; Cosenza et al, 2014; Cosenza and Nigro, 2015)
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