Gambling Prevention Program Among Children

Gambling becomes a more frequent activity among children as they have an easy access to the world of the games. In the same
time children are at a higher risk for developing problem and/or pathological gambling having erroneous information about
how games of chance and games of skill work. The purpose of the study was to compare the influence of specific primary prevention
with rational emotive education (REE) on the subjects’ knowledge about games. The experimental design randomly assigned children
(N = 81, age 12–13, 37 male and 44 female) into three groups: 1. control, 2. specific information about games using the interactive
software “Amazing Chateau”, and 3. REE. All children completed a questionnaire with 38 items at the beginning of the study
and after 10 weekly interventional meetings. Each item had three answering options, children choosing only one correct answer.
Findings indicated that the use of the software significantly improved subjects’ knowledge about gambling and corrected their
information about how games work. The results of the study confirmed that using specific primary prevention tools for changing
erroneous conceptions about games is more efficient than using only REE. The implications of these results for the prevention
of gambling problems especially in schools are discussed.