Faculty of Medicine, Department of Clinical Sciences Lund, Psychiatry, Lund University, Lund, Sweden.
Clinical Research Unit/Gambling Disorder Unit, Malmö Addiction Center, 205 02, Malmö, Region Skåne, Sweden.
J Gambl Stud. 2019 Jun;35(2):485-500. doi: 10.1007/s10899-018-9785-8.
Gambling disorder is an addiction that can cause major suffering, and some populations seem to be more vulnerable than others. Offender populations have a remarkably high prevalence of gambling problems and they are also over-represented in a number of diagnoses related to gambling disorder, like substance use disorders and antisocial personality disorder. Yet, there are few studies investigating gambling disorder prevalence and related psychiatric comorbidity in this group. This study aims to investigate the prevalence of, and association between, gambling disorder and other psychiatric diagnoses in a sample of young, male violent offenders. Two hundred and sixty-four male offenders, all serving sentences for violent crimes (recruited between 2010 and 2012) participated in this study and went through comprehensive psychiatric evaluation, including assessment for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 4th Edition criteria. Sixteen percent of the participants met criteria for gambling disorder. Antisocial personality disorder, cannabis, cocaine and anabolic steroids abuse were significantly more common among participants with gambling disorder. The gambling disorder group also showed significantly lower educational attainment. Cocaine abuse and failure to graduate elementary and middle school in expected time were independently associated with gambling disorder in a regression analysis. This study confirms the previously described high prevalence of gambling disorder in offenders. The psychiatric comorbidity was high and the problems had started early, with lower educational attainment in the gambling disorder group. The findings stress the importance of increased awareness of gambling problems among convicted offenders and of gambling research on young people with delinquent behavior. There is a need of more research to investigate this further, in order to develop preventive strategies and treatment.
赌博障碍是一种成瘾，会导致严重的痛苦，一些人群似乎比其他人群更容易受到影响。罪犯群体中存在着极高的赌博问题发生率，而且他们在许多与赌博障碍相关的诊断中也过度存在，如物质使用障碍和反社会人格障碍。然而，很少有研究调查这个群体中的赌博障碍发生率和相关的精神共病。本研究旨在调查一个年轻男性暴力罪犯样本中赌博障碍和其他精神诊断的发生率和相关性。264 名男性罪犯参与了这项研究，他们都因暴力犯罪服刑（2010 年至 2012 年期间招募），并接受了全面的精神评估，包括对《精神障碍诊断与统计手册》第 4 版标准的评估。16%的参与者符合赌博障碍的标准。反社会人格障碍、大麻、可卡因和合成代谢类固醇滥用在患有赌博障碍的参与者中更为常见。赌博障碍组的教育程度也明显较低。可卡因滥用和未能按预期时间完成小学和中学学业在回归分析中与赌博障碍独立相关。本研究证实了之前在罪犯中描述的赌博障碍的高发生率。精神共病率很高，问题很早就开始了，赌博障碍组的教育程度较低。这些发现强调了提高罪犯对赌博问题的认识以及对有犯罪行为的年轻人进行赌博研究的重要性。需要进一步研究，以制定预防策略和治疗方法。
