Online gambling. Young people, contexts, risks and addiction
Year:
2018-2019
Delegación del Gobierno para el Plan Nacional sobre Drogas. Convocatoria del Fondo de Bienes de Decomisados, resolución de 31 de agosto de 2018.
Funded by:
Main objective:
Summary:
Since 2008, digital technologies have been implemented to enable online betting, especially sports betting. In these ten years, technological evolution has allowed the diversification of the offer and the expansion of the market, with a consequent increase in the number of customers betting online. Technological advances will allow gambling companies to continue to explore markets and innovate their services in order to grow their business. In this sense, we hypothesise that as the digital world becomes even more central to people’s daily lives, it will be easier for bookmakers to attract new customers in a virtual environment that is familiar and comfortable. The dynamics of virtual contexts make it possible to disrupt the usual spatio-temporal coordinates of offline (face-to-face) businesses and shops. In the gaming sector, the disruption of spatio-temporal logics makes it possible to play on the Internet from any geographical location and at any time. As a result, more people outside the traditional profile of recreational or pathological gamblers are interested in online gambling, with a consequent increase in the number of customers. The possibility of playing 24 hours a day stimulates compulsive gambling and facilitates marathon sessions, significantly increasing the risk of developing an addiction.
Historically, gambling in Spain has never been considered as a business, due to its peculiar nature and the recognition of the disastrous consequences it can have. Most of the money invested by Spaniards has been in state bets with a large popular and community component (El Gordo de Navidad, El Niño, La Primitiva or quinielas). In recent years, the socio-cultural dynamics of gambling have changed. Among other things, we have lost the protective factor that made gambling something linked to the annual cycle and shared with friends, family and neighbours. This situation makes it easy for online gambling to become compulsive, individual and silent. In the socio-cultural sphere, the community elements that acted as a protective mechanism are diluted and there is no informal social control in online gambling. This situation invites us to hypothesise that, if the situation is not reversed, gambling problems will become more prevalent and serious in the coming years.
