Pathways to excessive gambling within the social community construct

Gambling is a leisure pursuit patronised by the majority of adults in New South Wales as well as in the rest of Australia. In the local community, electronic gaming machines are one of the most common gambling forms and NSW has one of the highest concentrations of electronic gaming machines per capita in the world, higher than in USA, Canada, and the United Kingdom, thus poker machines are easily accessible. Even if gambling is a recreational activity for the majority of participants, it causes severe adverse consequences for a group of people who gamble over their financial means. The research presents pathways within the social community construct from recreational gambling pursuits to excessive gambling quests, where the winning and the solitary space have taken over from the social recreational environment that initiated the gambling. The gambling pursuit has lead to personal and family implications well outside the mere gambling activity. The research was undertaken within Greater Western Sydney exploring local community recreational pursuits in a multicultural milieu. The individual data is collated from people seeking counselling help for their escalating gambling problems. The data is based on semi-structured personal interviews. The research explored pathways from social recreational gambling to excessive gambling within the local community construct where the social environment and personal factors were found to contribute to excessive gambling pursuits1.