Addiction trends: Internet v casino gambling

Gambling addictions always result from an interaction and interplay between many factors including the person’s biological and/or genetic predisposition, their psychological constitution, their social environment and the nature of the activity itself (Griffiths, 1999). There is no precise frequency level of a gambling game at which people become addicted since addiction will be an integrated mix of factors in which frequency is just one factor in the overall equation. This brief paper attempts to examine whether Internet gambling is problematic, and more importantly, whether Internet gambling is potentially more problematic than casino gambling. To do this it briefly overviews the empirical research on Internet gambling. It also outlines the literature on ‘Internet addiction’ and examines whether Internet gambling is therefore ‘doubly addictive’

Gambling in Great Britain:a response to Rogers

A recent issue of Practice: Social Work in Action featured a paper by Rogers that examined whether the issue of problem gambling was a suitable case for social work. Rogers’ overview was (in various places) out of date, highly selective, contradictory, presented unsupported claims and somewhat misleading. Rogers’ paper is to be commended for putting the issue of problem gambling on the social work agenda. However, social workers need up-to-date information and contextually situated information if they are to make informed decisions in helping problem gamblers

Collecting behavioural addiction treatment data using Freedom of Information requests

There is now a growing movement that views a number of behaviours as potentially addictive including many that do not involve the ingestion of a drug (i.e., behavioural addictions such as gambling addiction and sex addiction). As a consequence of being ‘medicalised’ and ‘pathologised’, such disorders have led individuals to seek treatment for their particular behavioural addiction. This case study examines a new method of collecting data on behavioural addiction treatment via the use of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests. More specifically, this case study briefly overviews two published studies that have used FOI requests to collate data on treatment of gambling addiction and sex addiction within the British National Health Service. It is argued that FOI requests for data have many advantages including almost 100% response rates (as organisations are legally required to respond to information requests), and nationally representative data that are highly objective

Fearless: Josh Griffiths

Continually a strong voice for the underrepresented on campus, working with other students and faculty to take initiative in changing campus policy and culture toward the LGBTQ community, and serving as a leader in multiple groups and organizations on campus, Josh Griffiths ’14 fearlessly advocates for members of our campus community, making Gettysburg a more open and welcoming space. [excerpt

Online therapy of addictive behaviors

Clinicians working in the field of addictive behaviors cannot afford to ignore the Internet. Psychological advice, help, and treatment for addicts are no exceptions, with both counseling and psychotherapy entering the computer age. This paper reviews the main issues in the area and approaches the discussion acknowledging that online therapy has to be incorporated within the overall framework of the need for clinical assistance. The paper also provides brief overviews of some websites as illustrative examples of what types of online therapy are available

Risky business: when a CRM vendor masqueraded as an ERP specialist

Taking a social shaping perspective we unpack the development trajectory of a packaged software product to show, that contrary to mainstream accounts, design is not completely specified a-priori and that the process continues throughout implementation, and use. We show how developers, in this case third party vendors, can continue to engage in shaping packages during implementation and also how users contribute to the development effort. In particular, we illustrate how a customer relationship management package application targeted at a particular organisational function was configured to make an enterprise wide system and the key role of the vendor in this effort. To do this we refer to a 3- year qualitative field study of an expanding United Kingdom based consultancy company undergoing extreme ICT related change. This empirical research is used to explore an often ignored phenomenon, that of the role of vendors in appropriating ICTs and the potential risks they bring. Through this, we highlight the plight and responsibilities of low-level organisational actors in this process in cognisance of the fact they usually have a minor role in ICT selection but become a major player in dealing with vendors at the implementation stage when the devil is truly in the detail. The risks we identify relate to: vendor sales pitches of products as specifically related to their capabilities and the products they put forward; the calling upon of organisational resources by vendors; vendor knowledge of the application are and the actual ‘social’, ‘technical’ and ‘organisational’ capabilities of vendors to deliver a working product. We also point to the risks managers in vendor and consumer organisations create by placing their staff in difficult conditions within appropriation processes. The implications of our work centre on the need for further research related to: vendor/developer risks of packaged software, custom and open source projects; notions of professionalism and ethics in the software industry and project working conditions

Ethical issues surrounding e-gambling data collection

Online gambling data collection is becoming a focus of interest for various stakeholders in the online gaming industry, since it is relevant for advertising, attracting new players, exploring new markets and trying out new products. Mark Griffiths, of Nottingham Trent University, and Monica Whitty, of the University of Leicester, give an overview of some of the ethical issues raised by data collection in the gaming industry and research undertaken in the gambling studies field

The women in IT (WINIT) final report

The Women in IT (WINIT) project was funded by the European Social Fund (ESF) from March 2004 until April 2006 under HE ESF Objective 3: Research into equal opportunities in the labour market. Specifically the project came under Policy Field 2, Measure 2: Gender discrimination in employment. The project was run in the Information Systems Institute of the University of Salford. One of the Research Associates has an information systems (IS) background, the other has a background in sociology. We begin this report with an overview of the current situation with regards women in the UK IT sector. Whilst gender is only recently being recognised as an issue within the mainstream IS academic community, thirty years of female under-representation in the ICT field in more general terms has received more attention from academics, industry and government agencies alike. Numerous research projects and centres (such as the UK Resource Centre for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology) exist to tackle the under-representation of women in SET careers, although the figures for women’s participation in the ICT sector remain disheartening, with current estimates standing at around 15% (EOC 2004). Various innovative initiatives, such as e-Skills’ Computer Clubs for Girls, appear to have had little impact on these low female participation rates. Additionally, these and other initiatives have been interpreted as a means to fill the skills gap and ‘make up the numbers’ to boost the UK economy (French and Richardson 2005), resulting in ‘add more women and stir’ solutions to the ‘problem’ of gender in relation to inclusion in IS and ICT (Henwood 1996). Given that there have been decades of equal opportunity and related policies as well as many government initiatives designed to address the gender imbalance in IT employment patterns, sex segregation in IT occupations and pay and progression disparity in the IT sector (including the latest initiative- a one million pound DTI funded gender and SET project), we could be forgiven for assuming that these initiatives have had a beneficial effect on the position and number of women in the IT workforce, and that even if we have not yet achieved gender equity, we can surely argue that there are positive moves in the right direction. Although we do not wish to make definitive claims about the success or failure of specific initiatives, our research, backed up by recent major surveys, paints a picture that remains far from rosy. Indeed a recent comparative survey of the IT workforce in Germany, Holland and the UK indicates that women are haemorrhaging out of the UK IT workforce (Platman and Taylor 2004). From a high point of 100,892 women in the UK IT workforce in 1999, Platman and Taylor (ibid., 8) report a drop to 53,759 by 2003. As the IT industry was moving into recession anyway, the number of men in the industry has also declined, but by nothing like as much, so the figures for women are stark. When it comes to number crunching who is employed in the UK IT sector and when trying to make historical comparisons, the first obstacle is defining the sector itself. Studies vary quite substantially in the number of IT workers quoted suggesting there is quite a bit of variation in what is taken to be an IT job. The IT industry has experienced considerable expansion over the past twenty years. In spring 2003 in Britain, it was estimated that almost 900,000 people worked in ICT firms, and there were over 1 million ICT workers, filling ICT roles in any sector (e-Skills UK, 2003). This growth has resulted in talk of a ‘skills shortage’ requiring the ‘maximization’ of the workforce to its full potential: ‘You don’t just need pale, male, stale guys in the boardroom but a diversity of views’ (Stone 2004). In spring 2003 the Equal Opportunities Commission estimated there to be 151,000 women working in ICT occupations compared with 834,000 men (clearly using a different, much wider job definition from that of Platman and Taylor (2004)) , whilst in the childcare sector, there were less than 10,000 men working in these occupations, compared with 297,000 women (EOC 2004). It is estimated that the overall proportion of women working in ICT occupations is 15% (EOC 2004). In the UK, Office of National Statistics (ONS) statistics indicate that women accounted for 30% of IT operations technicians, but a mere 15% of ICT Managers and only 11% of IT strategy and planning professionals (EOC 2004). Although women are making inroads into technical and senior professions there remains a ‘feminisation’ of lower level jobs, with a female majority in operator and clerical roles and a female minority in technical and managerial roles (APC 2004).

A Diachronic Analysis of Schwa in French

Since the beginning of the formal study of language, linguists have struggled with the phonological problems posed by the mid-central vowel sound schwa. Schwa poses a series of challenges for linguists who study many languages, and this is particularly true for phonologists and phoneticians who specialize in French. Most of the challenges that come from analyzing the articulations of schwa in French arise from the overlap it has with mid- and open-mid-front-rounded vowels in French such as in the second vowel in the word “atelier” (workshop) and the second vowel in the word “appeler” (to call.) In this study a diachronic (historic) analysis of schwa in the French language is performed in order to more easily explain the problems that schwa poses for Franco-linguists today. First of all, the nature of schwa is described and how schwa’s behavior plays into its role in Modern French. Problems proposed by reduced schwa vowels and the phonological processes that cause these reductions in Modern French are described. Vowel reduction is a phonetic process that occurs when changes in the articulation of the vowel such as stress, sonority, and loudness cause the vowel to be “weaker.” Finally, a diachronic analysis of the historical environments of schwa from Old French to Modern French is conducted in order to attempt to explain the challenges posed by schwa in modern French. The methodology for this paper involves finding the phonetic environments in which schwa has traditionally appeared from Old French to Modern French. Changes in the environments between each time period of French are finally examined to see how those changes have influenced modern phonological processes that influence the articulation of schwa. This study has shown that the disappearance and appearance of sounds in the phonemic inventory of French has greatly impacted how schwa is articulated in Modern French. Other linguistic processes such as labialization that were realized on schwa in the past are no longer realized, but they have proven to be essential in shaping the current vowel inventory of French