The WAGER (Worldwide Addiction Gambling Education Report) is a great resource for keeping up with new research on gambling and gambling disorders. This online science review is published by the Division on Addictions at Cambridge Health Alliance, a teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School.
This month’s edition of The WAGER – Vol. 15(6) reviews a 2009 study published in the Journal of Clinical and Consulting Psychology (Hodgins, Currie, Currie, & Fick, 2009) which reports on the effectiveness of different brief treatments for disordered gamblers. Brief treatments, which involve treatments of 10 sessions or less, have been effective with alcohol-related problems. This study examined an adaptation of the brief treatment model for disordered gamblers. The researchers found that all of the variations of the brief treatments reduced gambling among the participants over a 12-month period. For the full review or to access online reviews of research on other addictive disorders, visit The BASIS (Brief Addiction Science Information Source) at http://www.basisonline.org.
As always, we welcome thoughts and questions in the comments section below.
Hodgins, D.C., Currie, S.R., Currie, G., & Fick, G.H. (2009). Randomized trial of motivational treatments for pathological gamblers: More is not necessarily better. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 77(5), 950-960.
