AUTHOR=López-Torres Isabel , León-Quismondo Leticia , Ibáñez Angela 

TITLE=Impulsivity, Lack of Premeditation, and Debts in Online Gambling Disorder

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychiatry

VOLUME=11

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychiatry/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2020.618148

DOI=10.3389/fpsyt.2020.618148

ISSN=1664-0640

ABSTRACT=<p><bold>Background and Objectives:</bold> Gambling disorder (GD) is a recurrent and persistent problematic gambling behavior that impairs multiple areas of an individual's life. GD can persist through two modes: online or offline. This study aims to compare sociodemographic, clinical, and psychological characteristics between treatment-seeking online and offline gamblers and analyze the effect of the gambling mode (online or offline) on anxiety, depression, impulsivity, and debts.</p><p><bold>Methods:</bold> Seventy-nine treatment-seeking gamblers (96.2% males), who were simultaneously receiving treatment at a specialized Pathological Gambling and Behavioral Addictions Unit, participated in this study. The sample was divided into two subsamples: online (<italic>n</italic> = 29, 100% males) and offline (<italic>n</italic> = 50, 94% males); the characteristics of these two groups were compared and analyzed using Chi-Square test (χ<sup>2</sup>), <italic>t</italic>-Test or Mann–Whitney <italic>U</italic>-test (<italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05). Multiple linear regression analyses were performed to determine the effects of gambling mode on significant variables (lack of premeditation and debts).</p><p><bold>Results:</bold> The online sample with a mean age of 29.4 years mainly chose to engage in sports betting (45%, <italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05) and showed a higher lack of premeditation levels (25.8 points, <italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05) than the offline sample. In addition, the online sample was younger with respect to their onset to gambling (20.2 years, <italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05) and the beginning of their gambling problems (25 years, <italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05) compared to the offline sample. Online gambling increased the levels of lack of premeditation by an average of 5.43 points compared to offline gambling (<italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05). Accumulated debts of the online sample were lower (€11,000) than those of the offline sample (€12,000). However, the interaction between age and gambling mode revealed that online gamblers increased their debt amounts with age at an average increase of €2,726.33 per year compared to offline gamblers (<italic>p</italic> &lt; 0.05). No significant influence of gambling mode was found on GD severity, anxiety, and depression levels.</p><p><bold>Conclusions:</bold> Gambling mode has a significant relationship with lack of premeditation—a component of impulsivity—and accumulation of debts in treatment-seeking people with GD; however, no relationship was found with the rest of the variables analyzed. Future research with larger samples is needed to confirm these findings.</p>