blonde poker forum

According to the Gambling Commission they are.

Problem gambling prevalence was highest among those who reported that they regularly played poker in a
club/pub (20.3%) and those who regularly bet on dog races (19.2%), followed by 17.0% for
those who regularly played online slot machine style games and 13.9% for those who
regularly played casino games.

So 20% of regular poker club/pub players are problem gamblers. Apparently...

http://www.gamblingcommission.gov.uk/research__consultations/research/bgps/bgps_2010.aspx

What is the definition of problem gambler?

I think they used this

http://www.problemgambling.ca/EN/ResourcesForProfessionals/pages/problemgamblingseverityindexpgsi.aspx

Although they may have used another scoring method

And also this I think

http://www.problemgambling.ca/EN/ResourcesForProfessionals/Pages/DSMIVCriteriaPathologicalGambling.aspx

They are the two methodologies quoted in the study at any rate

Do you know what score you need to be considered a problem gambler?

The score scale seems to indicate anything other than 0 is a problem gambler:

Scores for the nine items are summed, and the results are interpreted as follows:


And thus with question 7 as follows:


I'm surprised it's only 20% of poker players!

That quiz is too easy.

I would presume only scores over 8 counted as problem gambling, but that's just my guess.

edit: checked on the report and yes A PGSI score of eight or more represents a problem gambler. A score of three or more on the DSM-IV is a problem gambler.

Anyone scoring less than 8 will probably never be a big winning poker player id suggest

fyp

I scored 24. Thats like 89% SHIP IT

3 points for everything except number 9?

Surprisingly no, I do feel a bit guilty when i always spend the birthday/xmas money from family members on gambling.

Questions 1 and 2 seem a bit ambiguous, went for 1 on Q1 and 2 on Q2.

Q1 is a banker 3 pointer!

Disappointed in you tbh.

How did you score on this?

http://www.problemgambling.ca/EN/ResourcesForProfessionals/Pages/DSMIVCriteriaPathologicalGambling.aspx

Hang on buddy, just trying to claw back some of the days losses on the hunter chase at Folkestone.

hes fucked.

I didn't score quite as high as I'd have liked. I don't suppose anyone could lend me a few % could they? Just til tomorrow

just play some thought games with Nagi. He seemed like an ATM!

i scored three.
based on advice in this thread i am retiring.

6. Has gambling caused you any health problems, including stress or anxiety?

Never=0    Sometimes=1    Most of the time=2     Almost always=3


333333333333333333333333333333333333333

I scored 5 on this, I think.

My problem with this study is that they're not comapring like with like. Let me take you on an abstract journey to justify this statement.

Consider the ability to lie to yourself and imagine it as quantifiable attribute, we shall call it delutitude.

The average delutitude of a poker player may well be very different from the average delutitude of an online slots player.

This is not a wild premise, as members of this forum will know, the nature of poker (particularly it's most popular form : no limit holdem tournaments) is that players regularly experience events that their intuition will tell them means they are a long term winner (such as being continually knocked out of tournaments when holding the best hand) when the reality may well be they are a long term loser. A regular person with low delutitude could easily fall in to this trap and be a long term donater at the pokers.

I think it's fair to assume that higher delutitude is necessary to be a long term donater at online slots. Consequently, you'd expect to see a higher average delutitude among this group, if indeed such a thing was possible to measure.

The other, and in all likelyhood more significant, factor affecting the skewing of delutitudes between poker players and online slot players is that there are a lot of reasons why people play poker. I suspect that the competitive challenge, the social aspect and dreams of being on TV are not what motivate online slot players to play and keep playing.

So then, we have our much higher average delutitude among slot players when compared to poker players.

Consider a problem gambler, we shall call him Alexei Ivanovich. In order to score highly on this test, Alexei must not be lying when he answers the questions and this includes that he not be lying to himself.

It would be reasonable to assume that the higher Alexei's delutitude is, the greater the chance we won't get a fair reading from the test.

When all this is coupled with the relatively low threshold by which this test designates people as having problems, it would seem that recreational gamblers who answer honestly are as likely to be counted as having a problem than people with a genuine problem who are telling some porkie pies.

There's two other things that I think should be considered if you were to want to take the figures from the study to use as evidence of which games bring about the most social problems.

The first is that you should look at the fact that poker does create a significant number of long term winners.

Although the number is small when compared to the long term losers at poker, it should be significantly larger than the long term winners at other games mentioned.

As evidenced by the posts in this thread. The mentality necessary and the lifestyle that a winning poker player follows will mean they will almost all produce a score of over 8 on the test.

It's not that they won't (as a group) suffer some of the bad shit that goes with problem gambling like relationship and health problems.

However, when it comes to the really bad shit that problem gambling brings about for the person and the people around them, you'd think a good many of them would be related to not having any coin.

Being a winning player and having coin-a-plenty at all times of day should mean that problem gambling for some is no more of a problem than a high stress regular job.

As I said above, while these winners will be few, they should be considered when crunching the numbers and you could even argue that this is another reason why the study was not really comparing like with like.

I only scored 16 :(

really let myself down on the last two, I've always lived with people who have lots of money...
 

The last reason is an example of a scenario that may or may not be the case, but it's hypothetical existance stands in the way of the numbers from the study offering proof that poker is a worse form of gambling than others. (Not that that's what the study says, but that's how people may choose to interpret it)

Problem gamblers could migrate towards poker. Entering at online slots or roulette machines in the bookies, and eventually making their way to poker and staying there.
 
This may mean that poker has more problem gamblers, maybe even a higher proportion than other games.

At the same time though, poker could be a far less ruinous game for them to play, both on a personal level and a societal level.

Poker could be the cannabis and house games the heroin. Why fuck with the cannabis?

i was going to say this, but in much dumber language, obv.

I only scored 2.  i'm rubbish.

I cba to write what Tank wrote - also couldn't really say it all without using formulas, Tank's way is much better - I was wondering if some politics could be at play in this report?

Pretty easy to argue that poker being more 'dangerous' means it should have a punitive tax put on it
And live slots being relatively less dangerous means you can allow casinos to have more of them

Or is it just bad stats for the sake of it, and they don't care what conclusions are drawn from it as long as they get paid for it?

I think it raises an interesting question. Does poker players 'healthy' attitude to risk mean that they then are prone to becoming problem gamblers outside of poker?

It's also worth pointing out that I really dug those numbers out of the report, and they were not highlighted in the press release or in any news story I read. I just thought they were interesting.

Online gambling in general and casino advertising on TV are the bogeymen at the moment I think.

Ask any online operator and they will tell you that the amount of winning players who earn enough to make a meaningful contribution to their lifestyle is very very low indeed.

This wins the thread

I'd like to raise the question: Can anybody beat the high stakes without a disregard for money?

Tank probably already said this but I cant understand his big words n that.

The difference with poker is the very strong illusion of skill. There is of course a very strong element of skill in poker, thats not what I am talking about, I'm referring to the way that variance can make players believe they have a much bigger edge than they actually do. All of us have been through periods where we think we own peoples souls when in fact we are just running well against them, and we have all had times when we think we are running like shit when in fact there are parts of our games that could be better. This creates a false confidence that most players have to some degree, imo many of the problem gamblers poker creates are not necessarily looking for a fix, rather putting way too much stock in their belief they can win. An illusion of control that can be so severe the line between skill and variance becomes blurred they start to play outside of their bankroll or even in the house games.

Of course the counter argument that perhaps should be made, is that poker may create more 'problem gamblers' but it is arguable by contrast that it also creates more 'careers' and opportunity, because obviously there are plenty of professional players and the house doesnt win. Its a tricky thing to try and argue that poker 'does good' more than other forms of gambling, but I think it does, slightly.

I wonder what % of the 1000+ runners at the UKIPT last week would have honestly thought they were +ev in that field

Almost all of them, I would say 99% of players think they are better than they are. My mum has been playing poker for about 6 or 7 months ($1 sit and gos) and its been fascinating to watch her, someone I never thought of as being anything close to a poker player, coming up with some terrible arguments claiming why she thinks she is really good and unlucky when she loses, sometimes talking to her is like ease-dropping on the smoking section of DTD.

is a 1 off poker game 100% variance?

ninja edit - that in its true meaning doesnt make any sense but i think you know what i mean

The old saying is poker is like sex, everyone actually thinks they are an expert, when usually they are rubbish at it.

yep, the only ones who are really good in both departments are the professionals

I would guess that the vast majority of players in Nottingham were +/- 10% ev (in a zero sum game) and that means after 12% juice all of those would be -ev.

Maybe 10% were +ev after juice?

And that might be an exaggeration.

I'd say 10% was toppy

Terrific thread, & I have too many strong views on it to even begin to contribute.

Good as the thread is, though, The Tank's ability to invent a brilliant new word takes the biscuit, & works so well.

delutitude

Says it all.

Yeah, you don't get many staking threads where people sell at 0.9.

Pmsl @ the smoking section of dtd comment. Its defo the fastest I ever smoke to avoid the utterly stupid conversations

Oh yes, add that to "delutitude" as the stand out comments.

I've taken to sneaking out the front, just to avoid it.

lol, I remember once walking through the bar at EPT Dortmund, crowded bar it was. I swear to god that there were so many bad beat stories going round that I actually managed to hear one combined, completely linear bad beat story from 200 different players as I went from one end of the bar to the other.

My favourite bad beat story:

Years ago, I was walking past Ram talking to one of his mates at the bar at the Vic.

I only caught a few words:

".. and the flop came deuce, blank, blank...!"

very good

This so much.

Does anyone think this sort of thing could encourage the Government to tax poker winnings?

nah, the Tories are going to tax it or they wont, reports like this come out all the time, very doubtful they will directly influence whatever is going to happen.

Hello James.

This. Also as I pointed out before, this info was pretty much buried in the report and we all know most politicians only read the headlines.

Hey Constant :)

I got 3x the upper limit LOL. Im a degen

I scored 1, and that was because of the ignorance of other people. To say that a poker player has to score >8 to be any good is wrong imo, there's a difference between knowing about risk/reward and taking advantage when the reward outweighs the risk, and having a disregard for risk.

edit: guess question 3 I need to answer more than zero, although anyone who knows me knows that I hardly ever play 2 days in a row, especially when I lose :D

but have you actually ever done any good at poker?

Flawed quiz for winning poker players if you ask me.

3. When you gambled, did you go back another day to try to win back the money you lost?

Never=0    Sometimes=1    Most of the time=2     Almost always=3                           

All winning poker players would be 3 on this alone!

8. Has your gambling caused any financial problems for you or your household?

Never=0    Sometimes=1    Most of the time=2     Almost always=3

Alternative answer - Not at all it pays for treats, etc = -3!

I don't see why this would be the case.  Just because you are playing the day after doesn't mean you are chasing the losses from the day before.  In fact I would argue that if you are a winning player then you consider poker to be one long session and don't really worry about losing sessions beyond analysis.

The way the question is worded isn't about 'chasing losses', if you're a good player you're probably playing everyday - if you lose one day you're playing the next day, you're not playing the next day with the intention of losing again - therefore you must be playing to try and win - which covers your previous losses. It's slightly ambiguous but I'm inclined to agree with Scott on both points.

I genuinely prefer gambling on stuff more than I like playing poker, in fact I think I like it more than anything else :p

I just love the sweat, my favourite part of gambing is that moment at roulette where you have an absolute chunk on and the dealer says "no more bets" and you get that churny feeling in your stomach cos you're like "fuck that's quite a lot of money pls win :)"

you can't get that anywhere else :p

oh zipit nit. giq

Definitely the buzz I get from gambling I've never really had from poker, although 3 barrelling with air in level 1 of my biggest ever comp playing WSOP, with the biggest hangover ever was rather fun. Sweating a £100 football bet is much more fun than playing a £100 poker comp.

So very very true