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Sports Gambling: The Effect on the World and the Future

Joe Hofmann

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Abstract:

This research, above all other qualities, examines why people get addicted to gambling on

sporting events. It analyzes critical questions asked by those associated with gamblers. It

scrutinizes tactics used by psychologists to treat sports gamblers as regular casino-based

gamblers. After a look into the history of gambling across the world, and then into the United

States, the paper challenges the psyche of current gamblers by breaking routines that they

commit. It than places them under a microscope and uncovers what makes them tick from the

inside out. Gambling can be considered a gateway to other disorders that can damage a person’s

life in more ways than just financial. Later, the research provides examples of what to look for

in schemers and fake professionals. It examines the differences between casinos, the tricks that

are pulled on you as a customer, and internet gambling. Finally, the paper concludes with a

personal account of gambling and ultimately optimism from the author.

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Gambling has been defined as the activity or practice of playing at a game of chance for

money or other stakes. To some people, it is a primary source of income; yet to others, it is the

source of their own destruction. In some cases, the ones most reliant on gambling to provide for

their family, are the same people who let the way of life consume their loved ones. Gambling

grips its victims by luring them in with promises of dignity and grandeur. This stranglehold is

responsible for many bankruptcies and even some deaths. What is the fascination with gambling

on sports? Why do people continue to gamble there last dollars away? Since the dawn of time,

human beings have been fascinated with acquiring different possessions while doing the least

amount of work as possible (ex: invention of the plow to dig up more dirt, evolution of

transportation, and other countless machinery parts). At our core, I believe we are lazy people.

Research shows that being compliant to our emotional needs offers a sense of security and

happiness because it pushes away the reality of a current situation that might bring us out of our

comfort zone temporarily. This type of behavior is referred to as “laziness”. (Upson, 2013)

Gambling offers the possibility of a luxurious lifestyle, all while managing the basic human need

of acquiring monetary substance, with minimal effort.

In the picture below, a survey done by David Khorram, Founder of Crowd Innovators,

depicts exactly what type of gambling Americans love the most. 14% of America claims to have

participated in an office type pool on the World Series, Super Bowl, etc. While half of that

number (7%) has gambled on a professional sporting event. Further, a little more than half of the

previous number (5%, 4%, 3%, respectively) have claimed to bet on a horse race, a college

basketball or football game, and lastly, a boxing match. Although these are not shocking

percentages, one needs to keep in mind that this is dealing with hundreds of millions of

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Americans; not to mention all of the illegal sports gambling that goes on that is undocumented.

(Khorram, 2014)

Gambling on sports has decreased over the last 20 years. In 1992, the percentage of

people who claimed to take part in an office pool was around 22%. About 12% of people stated

they gambled on a professional sporting event. In David Khorram’s survey he found that “four

demographic characteristics are related to one's propensity to gamble on professional sports:

gender, age, income, and education.” Several statistics are found to be interesting; college

graduates (24%) are much more likely to gamble on sports than non-graduates (14%). Men are

about twice as likely to gamble on professional sports as women (22%-13%), although this

should not be that shocking because most sports fans are male. The results found here are

generated from telephone interviews of 1027 adults. (Khorram, 2014)

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Although the earliest gambling tools were found in 6000 B.C. (dice cubes and board

games), we first witness gambling in the ancient times with the Roman Empire. It was outlawed

in Rome; however, the law was never really enforced upon its citizens. Archeologists have even

found literal signs that point to public places where gambling was held, indicating that the law

was not only disregarded, but not feared as well. There are countless other stories of gaming that

took place in Mesopotamia, India, Persia, China, and even Egypt as early as 7000 B.C. (A

History of Gambling, n.d.) One constant remains the same throughout the history of humanity;

each society has its own level of tolerance for legal gambling.  However, there have been

numerous counts of regulation and prohibitions put into place due to different scandals and

interests of the public. 

The first wave of gambling in America surfaced in the 1600’s. Any form of gambling

was primarily separated between two groups of people, Puritans and the English.  Entire colonies

were built based on these two groups of belief systems. Puritans decided to outlaw gambling

entirely.  Whether it was dice, playing cards, or gaming tables, everything was thrown out; even

in private homes.  This resentment towards gambling will be seen plenty of times throughout

American history.  However, the English took a different approach to the gaming conundrum. 

They viewed it as harmless recreational fun that could relieve stress at the end of a busy work

day. (History of Gambling in the United States, n.d.)  In some instances, giving the citizens what

they wanted (to a certain extent) was more effective then completely turning the cold shoulder to

any gaming requests they had. However, in the cases in which the citizens did not “go quietly”,

a different aura was created. By producing an atmosphere that entirely barred recreational

gambling, illegal gambling began to surface. Obviously, complete annihilation of gaming

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altogether did not have the affect the lawmakers sought after. (History of Gambling in the United

States, n.d.)

The Puritan faith looks upon gambling as morally wrong. Puritans believed an excess

want of money was the source of most evils. So with this knowledge, one can piece together that

the notions of greed involved in gambling were a little frowned upon. Puritans believed if you

wanted more than you needed, or spent more than you had, it put yourself in a financial hole that

was hard to dig yourself out of (which still holds true today; debt, etc.). Modern day Christians

still believe that greed is wrong, however, many Christians still gamble freely. In fact, in 2006,

studies show that only twenty-eight percent of Americans think gambling is morally wrong.

Statistics reflect that many Christians indeed gamble. Does this statistic offer a thought that most

gamblers do not see anything wrong with their habits? Not only do many Christians view

gambling as an entertaining activity, most of America sees it as enjoyable as well. (Vacek, 2011)

Amongst, these people who are recorded as gamblers, many of them fair themselves as

knowledgeable, competent sports fans; who have more awareness and understanding of the

games they are gambling on than a person who does not know the sport at all. Roughly a year

ago, March 19, 2013, a study was conducted by the “American Friends of Tel Aviv University”.

This research yielded a conclusion that shocked the gambling universe. Knowledge of the game

is not an advantage in sports gambling. A leading professor in the research, Professor Dannon,

explains, “Sports gamblers seem to believe themselves the cleverest of all gamblers.” He goes

on to clarify by saying that sports gamblers assume that because they know a player’s statistics,

or a team’s habits, or even something farfetched such as weather conditions, they can correctly

predict the outcome of a sporting event better than a run of the mill person who has no prior

knowledge to these factors. Both Professor Dannon and his associate Dr. Ronen Huberfield

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concluded that “neither betting experience nor knowledge of the arcane details of the game is

connected to successful betting outcomes.” (American Friends, 2013) The test done consisted of

53 “professional” sports gamblers, 34 soccer fans who were knowledgeable about the sport but

never gambled, and finally 78 people who didn’t gamble and had no previous knowledge of the

sport of soccer. All 165 people a part of the study placed bets on 16 Champions League

matches. It was assumed that the group with familiarity with soccer was going to have a higher

success rate than the other two groups; however, Dannon and Huberfield found that not to be the

case as their success rate was no better than the professional gamblers or the group with no

soccer understanding. In fact, the two most successful gambling participants in their study had

no background in the sport whatsoever. “This doesn't indicate that there is an advantage to

inexperience,” says Prof. Dannon, “Many others in the third group were unable to predict any of

the results correctly. But the outcome exposes the myth of knowledge as a powerful betting

advantage.” Professor Dannon goes on to explain further that the impression of control and

power sports gamblers believe they possess, actually is not there at all. The information gained

on a certain topic in sports betting is unrelated to a real-life outcome. He claims this should lead

psychologists to approach sports gamblers very differently than a casino-addicted gambler.

(American Friends, 2013)

Judging by the findings of this study, sports gamblers need to be characterized in a

different set than casino gamblers. If psychologists approach sports gamblers with the same

methods that they use to treat a standard gambler, the sports gambler will not conquer their

obsession. Sports gamblers need to have their thinking reengineered to break the illusion that

they can control the outcome or parts of an outcome to a sporting event before it actually

happens. (American Friends, 2013)

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With the compulsive habit of gambling, comes the side effect of substance abuse. A

study done by St. Michael’s Hospital Center for Research claims that 10-20 percent of people

with substance abuse problems, have gambling problems. “Gambling problems are often

accompanied by other conditions. Pathological gamblers have a four-times increased risk of

alcohol abuse and up to six-times increased risk of drug abuse; and also a four-times increased

risk of having some kind of mood disorder.” (University of Calgary, 2011) In the figure below,

substance addicts are cross referenced to see if games involving chance or luck have any

correlation to the abuse of the substance themselves. Bouncing off of Upson’s theory on

laziness; lottery drawings are leading the survey at 80%.

Even more unique approaches from psychologists should be taken to combat people’s

compulsivity with drugs as well as gambling. Gambling appears to be a form of “gateway drug”

due to some other conclusions this research has unfolded. Studies have “found that people with

both problem gambling and substance abuse problems were more likely to have attempted

suicide at some point in their lives and to have reported problems with sexual compulsivity.” (St.

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Michael’s Hospital, 2013) A reader can decipher from the study done by St. Michael’s and the

study done by Prof. Dannon, that gamblers can be broken down into patients with “control”

problems. They all cannot control their own actions when gambling and some of them cannot

control their actions in everyday life. What some gamblers do (and anyone addicted to anything

for that matter) is place their dependence on another substance to misuse. “Gambling” turns into

substance abuse and vice versa. (St. Michael’s Hospital, 2013) How should a person with

multiple addictions, who cannot control their own actions, be treated? This is a question that has

eluded psychologists for some time.

A study led by the University of Exeter and Swansea University claims that when a

gambler places a bet and almost hits the wager; the brain gives off the same impulses as if the

player won the bet. (University of Exeter, 2014) For example, if a player places a bet on the

Miami Heat beating the Oklahoma City Thunder by six points, and they only beat them by five;

the player loses the bet. However, the player comes so close to winning that their brain actually

perceives the tight loss as an actual win; depriving the player of the regret of betting that normal

people may feel, resulting in a stoppage of betting. Increases in brain activity of the gambler

“are linked to both how severe someone's gambling history is and how susceptible they might be

to developing a future gambling problem.” (University of Exeter, 2014) This “brain activity”

can also be seen when a person buys a lottery ticket and wins a dollar, or almost wins $100,000.

The reaction isn’t, “Wow, I lost…”, but instead it is “Wow, I came so close to winning all that

money, let me buy another and see if I can win it this time.” The study does not yield results

saying that near-misses cause gambling problems. The results simply state that near misses

cause the brain to react as if the person gambling won their prize. One of the quickest ways to

become attached to gambling is to win early in your gambling career, proving that you can win

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money, providing the illusion that you can be better than average at sports gambling. So by

winning a stipulation, the person could, in theory, begin to show early signs of addiction.

(University of Exeter, 2014) After all, who doesn’t like winning free money? The expression

“close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades” has never been truer.

Stemming off the topic of near-misses, the Society for Neuroscience carried out a study

claiming “problem gamblers”, when provoked by near-misses, tend to gamble more. “The brains

of problem gamblers react more intensely to near-misses than casual gamblers, possibly spurring

them on to play more.” (Society of Neuroscience, 2010) Knowing this, Vegas odds makers do

their best to create accurate and fair betting lines, this way no matter what side wins, it is a

thriller. The researchers discovered the brain area that answers to rewards by distributing a

quantity of the chemical “dopamine” was particularly energetic in these individuals. The exact

ramifications of the research are as follows. 20 gamblers (both ranging from the casual better to

compulsive betters) were hooked up to brain scans. The experiment was not sports gambling

related, but never the less, the brain reacts the same way for a “win” in a casino as it does at a

racetrack or on a stadium. The 20 subjects were to play a slot machine that rewarded about 75

cents per victory. When the subjects would win, the “brain’s reward pathways” would light up.

When two of the three columns would match up with like icons, and the third column would

narrowly miss the third and final icon, the brain pathways responsible for payment/reward would

still go crazy, even though nothing was paid out. U.K. researcher Luke Clark, PhD, of the

University of Cambridge is very excited about these conclusions. He says, "These findings are

exciting because they suggest that near-miss outcomes may elicit a dopamine response in the

more severe gamblers, despite the fact that no actual reward is delivered…If these bursts of

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dopamine are driving addictive behavior, this may help to explain why problem gamblers find it

so difficult to quit." (Society of Neuroscience, 2010)

Studies have exposed people who play games of chance or take risks, (such as gambling

on a close game) frequently believe that there is a portion of skillfulness involved in their

gaming. The delusion of power forces players to play more because they believe the main factor

responsible for their winnings is skill, instead of blind luck. “Matthew Roesch, PhD, an expert in

reward and behavior at the University of Maryland College Park” (Society of Neuroscience,

2010) said the augmented levels of dopamine “during near misses may be critical in driving

pathological gambling and supporting the misconception that games of chance involve any

skill.”

This little piece of information is crucial in determining what help is required to assist

these sports addicted gamblers. If what “hooked” people was just insignificant possessions or

material items, the ability to quit would be a lot easier; still relatively hard (just as hard as any

other “will-power” based addiction). The simple fact that there is something chemically wrong

with gamblers at a molecular level can shed light on the reality of just how hard relinquishing an

addiction is. It isn’t just some lower-class citizen who cannot control themselves for whatever

unfortunate reason. Most people literally cannot help putting down hundreds of dollars on a

meaningless baseball game in May because they are genetically wired to do so. Gambling

addiction is just as hard to squash, as cigarettes or tobacco. It just isn’t glamorized as much

because more people are affected by those products, as well as the life threatening affects they

have on the entire human body. Gambling can be life threatening in a way that influences those

around you, yourself, and now research shows it even shapes the parts of the body you cannot

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see. The chemical dependence on gambling can end a person’s life without the twisted mercy of

killing them.

Research suggests that multiple regions in the brain are poorly functioning in gambling

disorders, including learning and reward areas. Genetic features also play a role, with data from

twin studies pointing to some plane of shared risk between identical twins. “Environmental

factors are clearly part of the risk, including accessibility to gambling, location and type of

establishment. Childhood exposure to gambling through parents with a gambling addiction of

some level also affects gambling behavior later in life.” (University of Calgary, 2011) Equipped

with the information that gambling could be more mental than people thought, would it not be

logical to develop drugs to help treat these addicts? Sadly, there are not any drugs on the market

yet to treat gambling disorders; however, several trials have been attempted. Gamblers

Anonymous has attempted to lend a helping hand to those in need, but unfortunately not many

have heard about this organization (including myself). "While substantial progress has already

been made, the increased visibility and awareness into gambling disorders is likely to encourage

more innovative research in the field and hopefully better treatment," says David Hodgins head

of the university's Addictive Behaviors Laboratory. (University of Calgary, 2011)

As if the challenge of stopping any addiction wasn’t hard enough to begin with; the trek

has become increasingly harder because of the easiness of accessing gambling accounts on the

internet. Gamblers can lose all of their life savings without even putting pants on if they really

wanted to. Instead of traveling a decent-long distance (depending on where a gambler lived),

they can now take their time when placing a wager on a game. Internet sports gambling

revolutionized the gambling world, for the good and for the bad. With increased bets came

increased winnings; and of course with increased winnings, comes increased loses. Now, people

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who never had the time or even possessed any interest in gambling on sports can lose very large

amounts of money with a couple moves of a mouse. This raises the amount of people who suffer

from a form of gaming addiction, especially in those who had no exposure previous to internet

gambling. In a 2011 study done by the University of Calgary, it is stated that the influx of online

gambling opportunities has boosted the amount of people who will be diagnosed with a gambling

disorder; mainly due to the chances that are readily available on the internet. (University of

Calgary, 2011) As discussed in the article Links Made Between Problem Gambling and

Substance Abuse, and Lack of Treatment Options, this research touches on the conjunction

between mental health and substance abuse. “In the USA, about one per cent of the population

are pathological gamblers, with a further one to two per cent categorized as problem gamblers.”

Out of this percent, one of ten gamblers seek help. The other nine out of ten stay quiet, whether

it is because of denial, humiliation, or shame or any combination of the three. Surveys propose

that one third of serious gamblers recover, but their habits are “episodic”. (University of Calgary,

2011) Most gamblers try time consuming activities to self medicate their problem. They replace

gambling with anything they can find; work, friends, relationships, other addictions, etc. It can

be hard to avoid temptations and gambling venues when they are an intricate part of one’s

lifestyle, which is why so many gamblers have relapse. However, for those who recognize the

risks of their behavior and go to a professional for assistance, cognitive behavioral therapy has

been confirmed to work 60 percent more than no management of the disorder at all. “This

focuses on modifying distorted perceptions associated with gambling, including overestimating

probabilities of winning and illusions of control over the outcome of a gamble.” A term called

The Gambler’s Fallacy is the belief that a win is due after a series of losses. This conviction

gamblers have is responsible for many loses when teams go on winning or losing streaks (my

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friends and I have suffered from this several times). Another struggle gamblers go through is

remembering very clearly when they are successful in a bet, particularly in an “upset”.

(University of Calgary, 2011) They will recall to mind before placing a wager that they won two

months ago picking the Charlotte Bobcats as an underdog, but fail to consider that they just went

four for 80 using the same team, losing a thousand dollars in the process. The expression

“everyone loves an underdog” is true in fandom and the betting world. The risk of taking an

underdog is that you will most likely not win; but the reward is much higher because of the

simple fact…that you will most likely not win. This draws in people who are looking to “get

rich quick”.

Christopher Palmeri wrote an article on November 16th, 2013 in The Star Ledger, about

new laws that have recently been passed in the state of New Jersey to permit online gambling.

Delaware and Nevada are already fully internet legal, making New Jersey the third state to do so.

However, there have been several hiccups in Chris Christie’s plan to legalize online gaming.

Our generation is easily the most technology savvy in the history of the modern world. This

does not bode well for our nation’s future when all it takes is access to mom or dad’s credit card

to risk hundreds of dollars on a game that a teenager assumed they could win. Underage

gambling is a major concern for some credit card companies (Visa and Mastercard specifically).

Because of this possible liability, American Express and PayPal do not process any kind of

gambling transactions whatsoever. (Palmeri, 2013)

Young minds are vulnerable to just about anything if they are not properly supervised.

When teenagers and young adults are given access to the internet, parents should have a grasp on

what they are looking up. However, in the real world we know that this is not always the case.

As stated earlier, the internet can be very deceiving on children. From the ages of 12-17, a

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staggering 93% of kids use the internet, while “97% of teens (12-17) play computer, web,

portable, or console games.” (Internet Safety Statistics, n.d.) “Younger Americans are much

more likely to gamble on sports than older Americans -- 26% of 18- to 34-year-olds do so,

compared with 18% of 35- to 54-year-olds and just 11% of those aged 55 and older.” (Khorram,

2014) What is stopping kids from going onto a gambling site and throwing large amounts of

money into a website? Absolutely nothing. In a perfect world, children would not be sneaky or

deceiving in any way and therefore not have access to an adult’s credit card. But we have all had

our fair share of devious little tricks we have pulled as youngsters and know that kids are only

getting smarter.

Young people and adults alike partake in safe fantasy sport leagues, or “March Madness

Brackets”. Renee Cunningham-Williams, PhD, gambling addictions expert and associate

professor at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, claims “that young people

have not passed through the period of risk for many mental disorders, yet need to navigate

coming of age in an environment of increased acceptability and accessibility to gambling.” She

is adamant about the dangers of gambling and realizes how alluring media makes being a

successful gambler seem. (Washington University in St. Louis, 2012) Teenagers start off by

joining fantasy leagues with their friends for free, then gradually these leagues become for $20 or

$50, etc. (because if you are good at something, why do it for free). March Madness Brackets

and fantasy leagues weed out the problem gamblers when they are too young to know what they

themselves are. “Fun” and “harmless” gambling activities are gateway drugs that lead into

“broke” and “depression” filled gambling activities.

With this new information received about fresh internet policies and children getting

roped into the gambling world, a new question arrives as well. How are “professional” gamblers

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able to suck in so many new gamblers? There is a science to it actually. Countless tricks exist

that the so called “professional” gamblers use to capture novice gambler’s attention.

“Professionals” is in quotations because in reality, there is no such thing as a professional

gambler. In modern times, professional gamblers are the exact opposite of what people believe

them to be. Most real professional gamblers would not even call themselves gamblers. They

would call themselves “investors”. The people you and I perceive as experts are the loud,

obnoxious jokers on television who try to sell you their “gutsy picks of the week”. These people

are fakers. A real professional knows that a 70% success ratio or easy profits are not realistic.

But a new comer has no idea. They hear the screaming and yelling of these fools and assume

that it is obtainable for them and their friends. In actuality, these connivers make their living

selling their 65% winning strategies or their 1-star, 2-star, 3-star picks, to suckers who want to

make a quick buck; which circles back to the term mentioned on the first page, “laziness”. No

one wants to work a 9-5 when they can wake up at noon and make double the money. Schemers,

who declare that they are professionals, use this natural human emotion against hard working

Americans to scam them out of their pay checks. (Miller, 1997)

Placing bets has been compared to investing in stocks. In many ways a better puts a

certain amount of money down on a team as an investment of what he/she thinks the particular

game is worth. Some would even say playing the stock market is harder the gambling because of

factors that affect your stock outside of your control, such as insider trading, scandals like Enron,

and overpriced broker fees. The biggest difference between stocks and sports gambling is the

payouts. It could take months or years to get paid (or take a loss) in the stock market. But with

gambling on sports, your money could be in your pocket within a couple of hours. Consequently

this is gambler’s biggest downfall because you can lose your bankroll at an absurd rate. Not to

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mention with a stock you can gain back any percent in between of 0-100. When gambling on a

game, you either win it all, or lose it all. According to J. R. Miller, who has made sports

gambling his life, as well as selling his books to assist people in the benefits and dangers of the

gaming industry, a person needs about a 54%-58% win ratio to be successful as an actual

professional sports gambler. Not the 65%-70% that con artists feed poor taxpayers. In order to

win at least 54% of the time, the most important rule to follow is managing your bankroll. But

this requires patience and control; two qualities that most sports gamblers lack a great deal of.

Eliminating emotion from the picture can eliminate part of a gamblers loses. Sports gambling

must be looked at as a business if any success is to be had. Miller estimates about one in a

hundred gamblers have what it takes to make this their livelihood, not winning odds by

anybodies book, gambler or not. (Miller, 1997)

Casinos are a whole different ball game than sports gambling. They are run by some of

the smartest men and women in the world. Every inch of Las Vegas and other gambling capitals

of the world are designed to obliterate your pocket and leave you naked and confused

somewhere in an alleyway. There are dozens of techniques they use to snatch up you and your

friends into the crazy mazes that are casinos and nightclubs. As soon as you walk into a casino

beautiful women hand you free alcohol. Why? Because when you are drunk you can lose track

of how much money you spend. Why are the women beautiful? So they can trick you into

staying inside the building to stare at them longer. Would that not be against the law to hire

women solely on their looks to serve drinks? Many casinos hire women officially labeled as

models…who also serve drinks. The madness does not here; we just walked in. Next you will

not find a clock in sight, because if you realized it was three in the morning, maybe you would

leave since you have work the next day. Once you figure out what time it is you are so deep into

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the intended labyrinth that the architects built that you decide to play a few of the more

“exciting” looking games. In reality, these slot machines and card tables have loud flashing

lights and sounds only because if the boards actually played the sound of what was happening, it

would sound something like “WAH-WAH-WAHHH”. Bright colors give off the impression that

there are a lot of payouts being made, but quite the opposite is taking place. They are non-verbal

communications that all is well and no one just burned through their kid’s college fund. By now

you’ve ingested enough free alcohol to go to the bathroom. But good luck finding them; as these

services are deep in the catacombs of casinos. This is done as a last-ditch effort to get you to

spend whatever winnings you just made before you exit or cash-out. It is very hard to pass up

what looks like such a great time. After all this has come about to you, you just want to leave.

But the machines and tables are “organized” in such a way that you cannot recognize what slots

were located by the exits. It could take you ten minutes just to find a door in a big enough

casino. “This plays on the common mental error people make when they mistakenly believe that

if they walk in along a certain path, they can easily turn around and walk out the same way.

However, the path leading out is unfamiliar because visually it is completely different.” (Frater,

2010) Casinos are clearly no joke. Before the internet, casinos were the main legal place to

place sports bets. Many sports gamblers fell victim to these ploys that were set out by

administrators of these establishments.

Other interesting techniques have been used on analyzing sports gambling from a

psychologists stand point. According to John Mangels, a writer for The Plain Dealer, “B.F.

Skinner, the legendary Harvard psychologist, was so certain he understood the gambling

addiction process that he once bragged he could turn a bird into a betting fiend.” (Mangels, 2011)

To some extent, he did. Skinner is a legend in the psychologist field. During World War II, he

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famously trained birds to guide missiles to a specific target. Skinner claims that the answer did

not have anything to do with biology or emotions. Getting roped into gambling was simply a

learned behavior, the consequence of prize and repetition. He explains, "We don't say that the

human subject gambles to punish himself, as the Freudians might say, or gambles because he

feels excited when he does so...People gamble because of the schedule of the reinforcement that

follows." (Mangels, 2011) Skinner did not lack confidence. However, he could not explain why

some gamblers become addicted, while some can resist temptation.

I struggled with a sports gambling addiction for a long time, and in some ways still do.

As the University of Calgary found, sports gamblers cycle in and out of phases; some never fully

get over the addiction. However, I have learned to control my actions with the help of people

who love and care for me. I still gamble on the occasional football game. But the amount never

exceeds $10-20. For some gamblers like me, putting money on a game just means you are

looking for a reason to watch it; there is nothing malicious about it. Above all, having family

and friends who genuinely are concerned for your well being can bring you out of just about any

mess you are in. For me, focusing on long term goals I had set for myself cleared my mind and

helped me gather my thoughts. My advice to anyone struggling with this horrible addiction is to

never give up, because it can get better. Do not let yourself be part of a statistic in a journal

article.

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Bibliography

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Borghesi, Richard. "Widespread Corruption in Sports Gambling: Fact or Fiction?" Southern

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Carvalho, Simone Villas Boas de, Collakis, Silvia Teresa, Oliveira, Maria Paula Magalhães

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