Digital Scholarship@UNLV

Submission Title

Canadian Lower Risk Gambling Guidelines: Investigating Feasibility of the Guidelines in a Finnish Cultural Context

Session Title

Session 1-4-A: Collaborating among Problem Gambling Stakeholders

Presenters

Sari Castren, National Institute for Health and WelfareFollow
Tiina A. Latvala, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Department of Public Health and Welfare, Helsinki, FinlandFollow
Anne Salonen PhD, National Institute for Health and WelfareFollow
Riitta Matilainen, EHYT ryFollow
Michael Egerer, University of HelsinkiFollow
Jussi Jussi Palomäki, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Department of Public Health and WelfareFollow

Presentation Type

Paper Presentation

Location

Park MGM, Las Vegas, NV

Start Date

23-5-2023 3:45 PM

End Date

23-5-2023 5:15 PM

Abstract

ABSTRACT

At-risk and problem gambling is a significant public health concern globally, and it causes harm not only to the gamblers but also to their significant others as well as the society at large. This study evaluates the feasibility of the Lower-Risk Gambling Guidelines (LRGG), developed by the Canadian Centre of Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA), in a Finnish cultural context. The LRGG was developed to lessen the harms related to gambling in Canada, using gambling data from eight countries, including Finland. We use both qualitative and quantitative methods to find out whether the established guidelines of: 1) Gamble no more than 1 % of household income, and 2) Gamble no more than 4 days per month, and 3) Avoid regularly gambling at more than 2 types of games apply to the Finns as they are or do they need cultural modifications. We will present and discuss preliminary results of the quantitative online survey results (n = 500–800) and the qualitative focus group interviews (n = 44–70).

IMPLICATIONS

The goal of our study is to establish culturally sensitive safer gambling guidelines in Finland, which would help Finns to make informed decisions about their gambling. The guidelines also support the implementation of the programs aimed at reducing gambling-related harms and promoting public health. In addition, these programs can provide consistent evidence-informed advice about how to gamble in a lower-risk manner.

Keywords

Prevention, at-risk level of gambling, problem gambling, harm minimization, feasibility study

Author Bios

Sari Castrén, PhD, clinical psychologist with the title of Associate Professor at the University of Turku and the University of Helsinki, Finland. She is currently working as a Researcher Manager at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland. Her focus in research is developing interventions and investigating the efficacy of treatments for gambling disorder both for gamblers and affected others. Her new research endeavors are gaming disorder and harmful social media use.

Tiina Latvala is PhD in the field of public health. She works as a senior researcher at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Helsinki, Finland. Her research interests include societal costs of gambling, gambling, inequality, well-being, and health. She is familiar with quantitative methods.

Anne H. Salonen, RN, is a Doctor of Health Sciences. She is working as a Research Manager at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland, and serving as an Associate Professor (Public Health) at the University of Eastern Finland. Her research interests include quantitative studies monitoring health and well-being. She is a principal investigator of the Finnish Gambling population study. Furthermore, her research group evaluates harmful gambling using register-based data sets.

Riitta Matilainen has a PhD in social sciences from the University of Helsinki, Finland (2017). She is an economic and social historian who specializes in the history of gambling and in the methodological questions concerning class and gender in gambling studies. Riitta

currently works as a Head of Gambling Harm Prevention Unit at EHYT Finnish Association for Substance Abuse Prevention.

Michael Egerer

His research interests address gambling, gambling regulations and the concept of addiction. Egerer is an expert in the focus group technique. He is developing the application of sociological systems theory in the field of addiction and gambling research. Egerer is the editor of the gambling section of the Harm Reduction Journal and the chair of the Finnish Association for Alcohol, Drug and Gambling Research.

Jussi Palomäki

Jussi Palomäki is a cognitive scientist and senior researcher at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare. His current work is mainly focused on gambling harm prevention, but he maintains a keen multidisciplinary interest in cognitive phenomena such as decision-making, emotions, and risk-taking, as well as quantitative data analysis and visualization.

Funding Sources

The study is funded by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Finland, within the objectives of the §52 Appropriation of the Lotteries Act. Daily work of the authors SC, AHS, TL and JP (50 % of his work) at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland, was also funded by the Ministry. The Ministry has had no role in the study design, analysis, or interpretation of the results of the manuscript or any phase of the publication process.

Competing Interests

Sari Castrén works full time at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare and all her research work is funded within the objectives of §52 Appropriation of the Lotteries Act. Castrén also works as a clinical psychologist at Addiktum Clinic Helsinki, Finland as a private practitioner (part time) treating individuals mainly with addiction problems, and at Mehiläinen Medical Center, Forum Helsinki, where she offers treatments to various psychological issues. She is a clinical advisor to Canadian company Alavida, Vancouver, (remote/internet treatment for alcohol disorder). She is also lecturing about Behavioral Addictions (e.g., national and international conferences) and training and supervising professionals to treat gambling disorder (MI, CBT) as a part of her duty at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare and addictions in general privately. She has received fees from Helsinki University, Oulu University,Tampere City, Vocational school Stadia - Helsinki, Lundbeck, Mehiläinen for her lectures on behavioural addictions and training professionals and writer’s fees from the Finnish Medical society Duodecim, Myllyhoitoyhdistys ry, and received fees from Svenska Spel (Sweden) for evaluating research plans (grants) and Tampere University for preliminary examination of PhD work. She declares no conflict of interest in relation this manuscript. Tiina Latvala works full time at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare since August 2021 and all her research work is funded within the objectives of §52 Appropriation of the Lotteries Act. Latvala has not received any individual grants during that time. The funding body has not had any involvement in the any aspects of the research. Anne H. Salonen’s daily work at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare is funded by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Finland, within the objectives of the §52 Appropriation of the Lotteries Act. She has received fees from the Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse (CCSA) for her expert work in the Lower-Risk Gambling Guidelines Scientific Working Group, and from the Central Queensland University, Australia, for her expert work in the National Interactive Gambling Study. She has also received fees from the University of Bergen, Norway, the Åbo Academi, Finland, and the University of Helsinki, Finland, based on her supervision, opponent and preliminary examination work with PhD students. She declares no conflicts of interest in relation to this manuscript. Michael Egerer is funded by the Finnish Ministry of Social Affairs and Health within the objectives of §52 of the Lotteries Act. §52: The Finnish gambling monopoly has no influence on how the funds are distributed – the Ministry makes the decisions on the research to be supported and bills its expenses to the gambling monopoly. Egerer has no restrictions on publication. Egerer has during the last five years received funding from the Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies (FFAS) based on §52 of the Finnish Lotteries Act to support conference travel and for the realization of the project ‘The new Tampere casino: Laying foundations for a longitudinal qualitative study on the impact on gambling behaviour, harm, and the community’. During the last five years, Egerer has also received funding from the Academy of Finland (Academy project: GAMBLING POLICY IN EUROPEAN WELFARE REGIMES & ERA-NET project: Addiction in the brain: Ethically Sound Implementation in Governance). In 2018, Egerer received a honorarium from the University of Hamburg (Germany) for supporting the writing of a report on options to regulate the German online gambling market (Funded by the German Federal Lands of Baden-Württemberg, Hamburg, Mecklenburg West-Pomerania, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia, Saarland, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia). Riitta Matilainen has worked since April 2020 for a Finnish NGO that gets its funding via Funding Centre for Social Welfare and Health Organisations (STEA). Matilainen has not received any individual grants during that time. The funding body has not had any involvement in the any aspects of the research Jussi Palomäki works 50 % time at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare since August 2021 and all her research work is funded within the objectives of §52 Appropriation of the Lotteries Act. Latvala has not received any individual grants during that time. The funding body has not had any involvement in the any aspects of the research.