Recent Australian qualitative research has begun to reveal the complex layers of subjective meaning that individuals attach to their gambling practices and problems.
In the first national study of Australian gambling, the Productivity Commission identified that over 80% of Australians gamble and that there was no noticeable difference between the proportion of women and men gambling on gaming machines.152
However, research does suggest that men and women gamble for different reasons.
Although a number of Australian studies have specifically explored the meanings of and relationships to gambling among women, to our knowledge no contemporary Australian research has examined the particular experiences of male gamblers. Yet several surveys have identified young males as a potential ‘at risk’ group for problem gambling.153
5.1.1 Women and gambling
Until recently women have been ‘conspicuous by their absence’ in many studies of Australian gambling.154 This trend has been explained by moral and social conventions that discouraged gambling by ‘respectable’ women, and by traditional exclusion of women from gambling industries through formal restrictions.
Since the 1970s, however, women have experienced profound changes in workforce participation, economic independence, consumer status and household structures.
These transformations have corresponded with greater access for women to gambling products and services. Additionally, older women have reported that avenues for socialising which existed for them when they were younger, such as dance halls, no longer exist.155 Gambling venues such as clubs and casinos have offered a safe environment for women to enjoy a range of recreational activities, including gambling. Women now participate in many forms of gambling, most notably gaming machine gambling, at similar rates to men.
152 Productivity Commission 1999, op. cit., p.6.56.
153 For example, the Productivity Commission’s 1999 national survey and the 2001 ACT gambling survey.
154 McMillen, J. et al. (1999) Australian Gambling: Comparative History and Analysis. Victorian Casino and Gaming Authority.
155 Brown, S. et al. (2000) op. cit.
These changes have prompted several Australian studies to specifically understand women’s gambling behaviour and its effects. The majority of this research has involved quantitative analysis, often examining women’s gambling behaviour as part of more general community surveys. All such surveys over the past decade, including the 2001 ACT Gambling Survey, have found that women and men experiencing problems with gambling are most likely to play electronic gaming machines (EGMs).156However more recent qualitative research has focussed on gambling from the perspective of women themselves, suggesting that women experience gambling differently from men. We have been unable to locate similar research with male gamblers.
However, most studies of women and gambling treat women as one homogeneous group. A number of studies by Brown and her colleagues provide informative accounts of the significance of machine gambling in the lives of Victorian women.157 Research was conducted in the western suburbs of Melbourne, a region ‘unique in terms of cultural and linguistic diversity’.158 Importantly, the research undertaken in that series was sensitive to and directly addressed the cultural, age and economic differences between women.
They found that women gamblers commonly placed substantial value on the need to
‘belong’ and socialise in generally acceptable and safe social settings.159 Gambling seems to ‘fill a gap’ in the lives of women affected by loneliness, stress, low self- esteem or lack of friendship networks and alternative social activities. Gaming clubs and casinos provide a safe social environment where women can overcome boredom and stress by engaging in a range of activities, including gambling. This finding has been confirmed by other Australian studies.
A number of reasons and motivations lie behind women’s gambling behaviour.
Reasons given by women for EGM gambling include, but are not restricted to:
• Lack of other safe facilities where women socialise without being harassed;160
• Something that it was socially acceptable to do alone; 161
• Relieving stress, boredom, social isolation or tension;162
• Combating the stress of child-raising, changes related to children leaving home or relationship difficulties;
• Escape from pressures of work or the realities of life on a low income;163
156 McMillen, J. et al. (2001a) op. cit.
157 Brown, S and L. Coventry (1997) op. cit.; S. Brown, et al. (1999) op. cit; S. Brown et al. (2000) op. cit.
158 Brown, S. et al. (1999) op. cit., p.4.
159 Brown S. and L. Coventry (1997) op. cit.
160 ibid.
161 Brown, S. et al. (2000) op. cit., p.57.
162 Trevorrow, K. and S. Moore (1999) ‘The association between loneliness, social isolation and women’s electronic gaming machine gambling’. Journal of Gambling Studies 14, pp.263-284; New Focus Research Pty Ltd (2004) Study of Clients of Gambling Services. Stage 2: Round 1 Report.
Gambling Research Panel, Victoria, p.13.
163 Brown, S. et al. (2000) p.63
• Escaping mentally and emotionally from past or current traumas and unresolved grief;
• Escaping physically from chronic pain or other health conditions;
• Avoiding conflict and abuse at home;
• Reduced workload of family and household chores which gave them more time to gamble;
• The weakening of cultural constraints in their country of origin which disapproved of women gambling;164
• Playing machines does not need good English skills; 165
• Having good public transport access to gaming venues ;166 and
• Government promotion of gambling which creates the perception of a socially acceptable pastime.167
Other research has identified reasons for women’s gambling as a mixture of real life needs and ‘a myriad of fantasies’ such as social contact, time out, fun, luxury and glamour, control and choice. 168
The impacts of women’s gambling on family members have also been investigated.
For example, research in South Australia has explored the impacts upon children when one or both parents have a gambling problem and how the child perceives the experience differently depending on whether the problem gambler was the mother or father.169 That research found a difference between maternal and paternal problem gambling.
5.1.2 Men and gambling
Men with gambling problems are also a specific group of interest to this study. It is possible that many men will perceive, experience and respond to gambling problems differently to women; men also tend to comprise the majority of regular gamblers.
• Regular gamblers in the ACT are likely to be male (65.6%);170
• National figures reported in 1999 indicated that 60.4% of regular gamblers are males;171 and
• More problem gaming machine gamblers in the ACT are male and younger (under 35 years old) than other groups.172
Access to gambling close to the workplace, places of community congregation and residential areas has also been identified as a major factor for problem gambling in the
164 Brown, S. et al. (2000). Playing for Time: Exploring the Impacts of Gambling on Women. Report for Victorian Department of Human Services, Melbourne.
165 Brown, S. et al. (2000) op. cit., p.61.
166 ibid, p.71 167 ibid.
168 Hraba J. and G. Lee (1996) 'Gender, gambling and problem gambling'. Journal of Gambling Studies 12(1), pp.83-101.
169 Darbyshire, P. et al. (2001) op. cit.
170 McMillen, J. et al. (2001a) op. cit.
171 Productivity Commission (1999) op cit.
172 McMillen, J. et al. (2001a) op. cit.
ACT.173 A 2002 study of 254 workers in the building and related industries found that 11.5% of workers reported they had experienced a problem with gambling.174 Gambling problems were most marked in the 26-40 year age group, with 21.5% of workers in that group reporting problem gambling. The study noted that
…the proliferation of gambling opportunities and their association with social activities …is a particular problem for building workers because their social life revolves around workers’ clubs, particularly after work.175
Reasons for why men gamble and why some of them develop problems could be different to the experiences of women. For example, it has been suggested that:
• Men are socialised to be competitors and risk takers with competitive games allowing men to test and enhance their character and sense of self; 176
• Gambling, particularly those games that combine skill and chance offer men an ideal way to act on their needs to be competitors and risk takers in a culturally approved manner.177
• A Victorian study reported that men with gambling problems were more likely to have committed illegal acts or to have jeopardised relationships, jobs and education than women; and
• Male problem gamblers were twice as likely not to have married as their female counterparts.178
In terms of harm minimisation strategies, there has been little research into the particular needs or behaviours of men with gambling problems. However the ACT Needs Analysis found that some men in the ACT practice harm minimisation by going to the TAB because it is a less continuous form of gambling.179
More generally, public health research has shown that men are less likely to seek help for medical, psychological and substance abuse problems than women.180 When they do contact professional services with their problems, they tend to do so only when the problem has become severe or acute; women are more likely to seek early intervention. These findings have been markedly consistent for men of different ages,
173 Marshall, D. et al. (2004) Gaming Machine Accessibility and Use in Suburban Canberra: A Detailed Analysis of the Tuggeranong Valley. Report prepared for the ACT Gambling and Racing Commission.
174 Banwell, C. et al. (2002) From the Ground Up: A Report on the Need for an ACT-based Rehabilitation, Half-way House and Counselling Service. National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University. This study did not use a problem gambling
‘screen’ (eg SOGS, CPGI); workers were asked to self-identify as having a gambling problem.
175 ibid, p.30.
176 Lair Robinson, R. (1997) ‘Men and gambling’ in S. Straussner and E. Zelvin (eds), Gender and Addictions: Men & Women in Treatment. Jason Aronson Inc., New Jersey, pp.2-16.
177 ibid.
178 School of Social Work at the University of Melbourne (2000) Client and Service Analysis Report No. 5 – Analysis of Clients Presenting to BreakEven Problem Gambling Services July 1, 1998 to June 30, 1999. Department of Human Services, Melbourne.
179 McMillen, J. et al. (2001) op. cit.
180 Addis, M.E. and J. R. Mahalik (2003) ‘Men, masculinity and the contexts of help seeking’, American Psychologist, 58(1), pp.5-14.
nationalities, and ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Several reasons have been suggested for these gender differences:181
• Women may recognise problems more readily than men;
• Men may be essentially more independent and self-reliant than women;
• Men’s help-seeking behaviour may be the product of cultural values, norms and ideologies acquired in gender-role socialisation; that is, men learn to behave in certain ways as part of learning what it means to be male (or female). For example, men may have more negative attitudes towards expressing emotions and confiding in a counsellor;
• Individual men may have different understandings of what is ‘normal’
behaviour.
• Men are not likely to seek help for problems that are seen as ‘unusual’
behaviour, especially if that activity is central to their self-identity.
• Men are less likely to seek help when they perceive other men in their social networks as disparaging the process.
• Men prefer approaches that do not involve expressing emotions, such as cognitive therapy and self-help strategies.
• Men are more likely to seek help when it can be reciprocated.
• The social context and the influence of peers play an important role in shaping the way men respond to problems.