The Brief Addiction Science Information Source (BASIS)

The WAGER Vol. 9(43) - Beating the Odds: Will Knowledge of the Sport Help Win the Wager?

There is a wealth of statistics and other information available to the general public regarding the performance of sports teams and their players; there are even professional handicappers who assess the odds of whether a certain team or athlete will win or lose based on statistics relating to injuries, playing conditions, current trends in team statistics, as well as knowledge of the bettors and their betting tendencies. For some wagering on the outcome of sports matches, these statistics and odds help determine their choice of bets because they believe that knowledge and understanding of this information will greatly enhance their... Read more →

The WAGER Vol. 9(42) - Clients on the Move

Past research has shown that clients who remain in addiction treatment longer have better outcomes (Condelli & Hubbard, 1994; Gossop, Marsden, Stewart, & Rolfe, 1999). Researchers and clinicians have identified and studied multiple factors that might lead some people to stay in treatment and others to drop out before completion. New research by Beardsley et al. (2003) suggests something as simple as how far clients must travel to reach the treatment center can affect how likely they are to continue treatment. This week’s WAGER discusses these findings and suggests implications for gambling treatment research and policy. Counselors at state-funded substance... Read more →

The WAGER Vol. 9(41) - Seller Beware? Educational workshops for VLT retailers

Programs aimed at reducing problem gambling can range from treatment facilities for those already suffering from gambling problems to population oriented interventions that include advertising and public service campaigns. Most of these programs rely upon the gamblers’ initiative to seek help or help themselves. An innovative program in Quebec provides awareness promotion workshops for gambling retailers. In this week’s WAGER, we discuss the results of a study that monitored retailers’ impressions of gambling problems before and after one of those workshops (Ladouceur et al., 2004). Ladouceur et al. (2004) studied a sample of 707 Video Lottery Terminal (VTL) retailers (28.5%... Read more →

The WAGER Vol. 9(40) - Hitting the Books… and the Tables: Part 2: The More You Know, the Less You Learn?

Many gambling studies have shown that people with less education might be more susceptible to certain forms of gambling (e.g., playing the lottery) and to developing gambling problems (see Abdel-Ghany & Sharpe, 2001; Welte, Barnes, Wieczorek, Tidwell, & Parker, 2004). Last week, the WAGER reviewed a study by Hertwig, Barron, Weber, and Erev (2004) suggesting that being provided with the exact odds might actually be as much of a liability as not knowing them. This week, in the second of this two part series, the WAGER reviews an article by Evans, Kemish, and Turnbull (2004) which showed that people with... Read more →