ArticleJMIR mental health2021
Burden and Help-Seeking Behaviors Linked to Problem Gambling and Gaming: Observational Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis.
Article in JMIR mental health, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Gambling-related suicides and suicidality: A systematic review of qualitative evidence.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2022Pooled it
- Long-term efficacy of an optimized online gambling self-exclusion procedure with extended suspension of commercial solicitations: a randomized controlled trial.Harm reduction journal · 2025Trial
- Online Personalized Normative Feedback to Foster Intention to Change and Help Seeking in Young Adults With Disordered Gambling and Trading Behaviors: Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial.JMIR research protocols · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundModels based on the uniqueness of addiction processes between behavioral addictions are highly contentious, and the inclusion of gaming disorder in the addiction nosography remains controversial. An exploratory approach could clarify a hypothesized common and subjectively identifiable process in addictive behaviors and the necessarily different expressions of the disorder due to behavior specificities, in particular the sociocultural characteristics and profiles of users.
objectiveThe aim of this study was to describe the nature of contacts to a help service by exploring commonality and specificities of burden and help-seeking for problem gambling or gaming.
methodsThis was an observational quantitative-qualitative study. We included all contacts (ie, online questions and contacts by phone or chat when the helper completed a summary) to a helpline for gamers, gamblers, and relatives over a 7-year period. We constituted a text corpus with online questions and summaries of contacts by phone or chat. We collected basic sociodemographic data, including the device used to contact the service (phone or internet), contacting the service for oneself ("user") or being a relative of a user and type of relative, gambling (yes/no), gaming (yes/no), and age and sex of the gambler/gamer. We describe the corpus descriptively and report the computerized qualitative analysis of online questions, chat, and summary of phone calls. We performed a descendant hierarchical analysis on the data.
resultsA total of 14,564 contacts were made to the helpline, including 10,017 users and 4547 relatives. The corpus was composed of six classes: (1) gaming specificities, (2) shared psychological distress and negative emotions, (3) the procedure for being banned from gambling, (4) the provided help, (5) gambling specificities, and (6) financial problems.
conclusionsNegative emotions and shared distress linked to gambling and gaming support current scientific consensus that these behaviors can produce psychological distress in se; however, meaningful differences were observed in core symptoms of addiction between gamers and gamblers, beyond specificities related to the behavior itself: loss of control was elicited in the class corresponding to gambling specificities and not by gamers and their relatives.
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