Healthcare Training Institute - Quality Education since 1979
Psychologist, Social Worker, Counselor, & MFT!!

Section 1
Track #1 - Introduction

Question 1 found at the bottom of this page
Answer Booklet | Table of Contents
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Welcome to the Home Study Course sponsored by the Healthcare Training Institute, homestudycredit.com.  This course is entitled, Gambling Addictions:  Interventions for the Family.

Our primary intent for this home study course is to provide quality education to foster your professional growth.  The Institute has provided quality education since 1979.
 
We appreciate that you have chosen us as a vehicle for you to earn your Continuing Education Credit.

The purpose of the course is to assist you in increasing your knowledge regarding how to treat patients, clients, etc. dealing with gambling addictions.  As each case study is given, if the concepts seem to be applicable to your situation, I encourage you to turn your CD player off and make a few notes regarding the application of the principle to your setting.  However, these notes are for your purposes only and are not to be sent to the Institute.  Also each track is very content dense.  So feel free to replay the track to review the content either for your own purposes, or if you feel appropriate play the track in an individual or group session for client education.  Also permission is granted to reproduce this CD.  We encourage you to duplicate and give copies of this CD to colleagues, clients, etc. as you deem appropriate. We feel the information on our CD's is valuable.  Thus, we have an interest in distributing CD's in as many ways as possible, to benefit the greatest number of people, who have a need and are receptive to this practical information.

The questions in your Answer Booklet are sequential and deal with the section of content that preceded it.  For this reason, to facilitate the answering of each question, you might read the question from the Answer Booklet prior to listening to that CD track.  By knowing what the question is ahead of time, you will then know the content to listen for that contains the answer.  So just a hint, after you write down the answer to a question in your Answer Booklet, read on to the next question in order to give you a “heads up” to listen for the content that contains the answer to the next question.

Merely write the correct letter on the corresponding blank line in your answer booklet. Each answer is only used once. Keep in mind there is nothing tricky or hard about these questions.  They are merely intended to verify the playing of this CD.

For the purpose of brevity, most generally, I will use the term “therapists” or “mental health professional.”  However, don’t let these terms deter you from applying the concepts to your situations.  When you hear the word “therapists,” if your job title is social worker, psychologist, marriage and family therapist, mental health counselor, professional counselor, resident director, program assistant, etc. merely substitute the appropriate term that is the most meaningful to you. In short, don’t let my use of the term “therapists” cognitively set you off track from hearing the content because your job title is school counselor, for example.  I will also use the term “client” for the purposes of brevity.  However, if you deal with patients, residents, students, consumers, etc., transpose “client” for the term that is the most meaningful to you in your work setting. 

On this CD set we will discuss such topics as: making gambling easier, raising bottom, interventions, teen gambling, breaking the addictive cycle, and staying stopped.

So  let’s get started

On the rest of this track we will discuss pathological gambling.  Our discussion will focus on the cost of gambling, co-occurring disorders, and denial. 

Pathological gambling is placed in a category of its own by the American Psychiatric Association.  As you are aware, clients who are commonly called compulsive gamblers are preoccupied with gambling, and they get edgy and nervous if they cannot place bets.  Compulsive gamblers may believe money is both the solution to and the cause of all of the problems in their lives.

#1  Cost of Gambling:  Often, clients bet larger amounts of money than they intended to, and these amounts grow even larger over time.  Not surprisingly these clients usually lose their money, but that does not stop them.  Pathological gamblers may return the next day to try to win back their losses.  As you know, over time gambling becomes a bigger and bigger part of their lives, interfering with work, relationships, and other interests.  Often at this point compulsive gamblers try to stop gambling, but they cannot even though they may have to borrow money to support the habit.  Some clients may even break the law to obtain money so they can gamble.

The DSM estimates that between two and three percent of the adult population in the United States are compulsive gamblers.  Male compulsive gamblers often begin during adolescence.  However, women tend to start to gamble later in life.  By the time a compulsive gambler seeks help, clients generally have an average debt running from $55,000 to $92,000. 

#2  Co-Occurring Disorders:  Pathological gambling usually occurs along with other problems.  About three quarters of compulsive gamblers in one study suffered from ADD, as well as hyperactivity.  About half of those gamblers with ADD reported that they also had trouble controlling the amount of alcohol they drank.  Some researchers believe that compulsive gamblers place bets as self-medicating behavior because gambling temporarily makes clients feel better.

#3  Denial 
Denial, as you know, is refusing to acknowledge something to oneself, thereby getting oneself to actually believe that there is no danger at all.  However, it is not only the gambler who often flounders in denial, but the spouse and family, as well.  Would you agree that regardless of the form of denial, it is a technique used to explain away, minimize, justify, and rationalize the problem gambling?  The simplest form of denial is to insist the gambling is not happening.  I find that this is sometimes done despite clear evidence or firm testimony to the contrary from friends or relatives.

More complex is the rationalization that admits that he gambles but discounts the severity of the gambling.  Although, in the short run, denial serves the purpose of keeping the family harmony intact and permits the family to conduct their daily lives in a semi normal way without anxiety, depression, shame, or anger overwhelming them.  However, as you know, in the long run denial is counterproductive.  The gambling client takes solace in the fact that he can fool his spouse, that he can get away with his gambling.  When the spouse takes his side, in effect going along with him in his gambling behavior by denying reality, she is only encouraging him. 

On the next track we will discuss enabling.  Four categories of enabling we will discuss are covering up and covering for the gambler, attempting to control the gambler’s behavior, bailing him out, and cooperating with him.

QUESTION 1
What is a commonly held belief among compulsive gamblers? To select and enter your answer go to Answer Booklet