Paul Reaney: Since starting your academic career, your name has outgrown the classroom, how did that happen?

Mark Griffiths: When I first started, I organised a national conference on adolescent gambling and got together lots of headmasters, probation officers, people who worked within the criminal justice system and other academics, a whole different group of stakeholders who seemed to think there was a potential problem with a small minority in relation to fruit machines and that got a lot of publicity. I ended up on the front of the Daily Mirror which meant my name was now with journalists as an ‘expert’ on gambling. I became the first academic to publish papers on internet gambling, internet addiction, online video game addiction. If you’re the first to do something, even if what you say isn’t groundbreaking, the fact that you said it first means that everyone has to cite you - you’re seen as the innovator. I was in the right place at the right time and whenever the subject came up, newspapers called. My working philosophy has always been to create the bandwagon, not jump on it!

PR: Your research unit has come a long way, with seven current members. Are they allowed to gamble or are they banned?

MG: Banned? Absolutely not! I am most definitely not anti-gambling. I’m pro-responsible gambling. I’m a gambler myself. I enjoy playing roulette. I used to call it ‘research’ but now play for pleasure! I see gambling as buying entertainment. I go to the casino here in Nottingham. I’ll have a cordon bleu meal, a drink and spend my twenty or thirty pounds that I have put aside to play. When I go in at 6pm and leave at 11.30pm, I know that the amount of money I have spent equates to a good value leisure experience. It is the same as going to a football match or a rock concert. When individuals start gambling to win money, and that is their only objective, that is when problems can start. That’s when a proportion of vulnerable people can get into difficulty.

PR: So why do people gamble?

MG: Gambling is one of those activities where people effectively can get something for nothing, which is why some people will take risks. The attraction of a lottery for example is that for a very small stake you can have a life-changing experience – a lot of people don’t see it as gambling. People who enjoy playing roulette or betting on a football match enjoy the betting or gaming experience itself. The psychology of different groups is very different.

PR: The two disciplines you have highlighted are very much split on gender lines – male and female – is there a difference on how these groups interact with gambling products?

MG: There’s a very big difference. Women tend to prefer chance-based games and men skill-based games. Even in some games that are predominantly chance-based, men attempt to impose some level of skill. Poker, for example, which people regard as skill-based, has a massive amount of luck involved. Similarly, men, often in their own minds, change playing a fruit machine from a chance-based event into a more skill-based activity. The other factor to consider is that women don’t like it when other people see them losing. On a slot machine, no-one sees you losing so it’s very often a very guilt free, private experience. With men, on the other hand, even when they lose big, there’s a machismo attached to it that says, yes, I’ve lost £500 but I can afford it.

PR: No-one sees you winning or losing on the internet, where is the growth in that sector?

MG: The two fastest growing media on the net are poker and betting exchanges. But the reasons for them taking off are not gender-based; the reasons are value and inter-punter betting. In Poker, all the operators do is take three per cent commission while the players play a product that they feel is skilful. For punters on betting exchanges, playing against other people, inter-gambler competition, is very important. They believe that they have a more informed viewpoint than their peers.

PR: You’ve been involved in a lot of advisory bodies. The Society for the Study of Gambling, Gamblers Anonymous General Services Board and National Council on Gambling. In terms of gambling legislation, what do you think the role of the state should be?

MG: In my view, it’s definitely not to inhibit gambling, but it is to protect vulnerable groups, to make sure people who do engage in gambling are fully aware of all the consequences. It’s about informed choice. If you’re going to deregulate gambling, as we are in the UK, you are going to see an increase in problem gambling. That’s what we psychologists call the ‘availability hypothesis.’ However, in jurisdictions that have created prevention and education programmes that run alongside deregulation, such as helplines and prevention measures, gambling problems still go up but they go up at a far slower rate than when jurisdictions have done nothing. To create the right framework, all stakeholders must work together, including the gambling industry.

PR: This throws up some logistical problems for the online community, how do you see them being able to measure diminished responsibility and vulnerable groups?

MG: Today, if I want to gamble from my computer all day I can do so. If I go down to my local casino and I’m obviously drunk, I won’t be able to gamble because they will recognise that I cannot make an informed choice in my intoxicated state. Internet operators have put a lot of protection in place to protect vulnerable groups such as adolescents where we know that rates of problem gambling are three to four times more than in adults. But, if you’re a known problem gambler or you’re learning disabled or you’re intoxicated, how can remote gambling operators protect you? I haven’t got the answers. The point is, in an offline world there are protective ‘gatekeepers’ but in internet, TV and mobile phone gambling it is much harder to protect vulnerable groups.

PR: Is there a tolerable level of problem gambling? Or do you think the only way to remove problem gambling is to ban gambling altogether?

MG: Even if you banned all forms of gambling you are never going to eradicate it. It’s a natural part of human civilisation. For example, in online computer game worlds like ‘Everquest’ the players are gambling amongst themselves. I don’t think I or anyone else should be able to tell a rational adult what to do but I do have an issue with companies allowing children or known problem gamblers to gamble. In this country we have a relatively low level of problem gambling. But I do predict it will rise as a result of the Gambling Bill and increased opportunities to gamble. It’s how we provide help for those people, and having as many education, prevention and intervention measures in place as possible. Corporate social responsibility should be like a stick of Blackpool rock; wherever you slice it, social responsibility should be running through the core of all industry practices. I’ve seen it in all Scandinavian countries, where I have been a consultant to most of the gaming companies, so I know it can work. Social responsibility is absolutely embedded in their practices from game development through to application.

PR: Problem gambling is not something the industry wants either.

MG: That’s true. I want to protect that vulnerable group and I think the gambling sector does too. It’s incumbent upon the industry, to provide people the information they need. In the case of casinos, what the industry really needs to do is take the three per cent of the British public who are currently regular casino patrons – and remember, I’m one of those three per cent – and increase that total to somewhere closer to 25 per cent, which I think is realistic, and get each patron to spend a little less. The ideal scenario is to increase the revenue by making gambling more attractive to a wider audience.

PR: One of the widest audiences in the world, America, is facing up to the ban on internet gambling. It is estimated that internet gambling companies lost $7billion in market value the day after Congress passed legislation. Given your thoughts on the way gambling is impossible to outlaw, what are your views on the way American policy has evolved?

MG: It’s a total over-reaction. It’s a sledgehammer to crack a nut. It’s totally unpractical. You cannot ban internet gambling. The only way forward is to legitimise these companies and work with them and make them adhere to the same set of regulations that the off-line companies do: charge them company tax, etc. Okay, it’s a bit more problematic because you’re working with a global customer base but I’m sorry, the genie’s out of the bottle. It’s obviously very sly of the US Senate to ban internet gambling on the back of another bill, but at the end of the day, American gamblers are still American voters. Gambling is endemic in American society and while the Government have targeted credit card agencies, what will happen is that there will be more innovative electronic payment systems that do not involve the use of credit cards. The point is that the measure introduced will not stop internet gambling and I really don’t understand this knee-jerk, prohibition type stance, a lot of which appears to be rooted in right-wing religious fundamentalism. I do think at some point it will be reversed because it will just become unworkable. Technological advances are always two steps ahead of legislation. There are a lot of inventive and innovative people out there who will come up with new ways of paying in order to circumvent the legislation.

Printer friendly version

Email this article to a friend