Students and Gambling’s Grip

Gambling’s entertaining for most students, but an unlucky few can get hooked on the high.Know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em.

Randy McNally doesn’t have to look very far for a game to bet on. 

“It is all a matter of knowing where to look,” said McNally, a sophomore at the University of California at Berkeley. “It is all over campus, but it is not a problem all over campus. Just some people have a problem — and the rest of us are enjoying penny poker.”

Just as social smokers light up at a bar on weekend nights or during a deep coffeehouse conversation, most social gamblers flirt with the game in an on-again, off-again way. They’re not addicted, and they find betting entertaining.

“Gambling can have a good side and provides a very popular recreational activity for millions and millions of people,” said Stanley Sludikoff, the editor and publisher of the industry newspaper Gambling Times. “It is only when the person starts to let gambling cause serious harm in his or her life that a problem exists.”

But a significant number of penny poker players in college graduate to become bettors in search of the mother lode, according to a survey published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. It showed that 6 to 8 percent of college students-a higher percentage than any other age group-are “probable pathological gamblers.”

Pathological is a serious word, but experts say it’s accurate. Once gamblers get hooked, they’re in the game for the long term. That’s what happened to Jim, a graduate of the University of Arizona who asked that his last name not be used.

“There is that moment when you don’t know if you are going to win or lose, and it is a rush,” Jim said. “You start to make friends with others in your group,” he explained, and the company of others sometimes enables more risky betting.

Jim, who said he gambled for 25 to 30 hours a week, didn’t seek out the rush. He and many of the students he gambled with were looking for a simple way to earn tuition money.

“I played social poker in a bar and paid my way through college,” Jim said. “Once I got in a game with $500 and had lost $1,500 by the end of the night. I played all Saturday and all Sunday and ended up $100 up by the end of the weekend.”

Because he had a hard time finding a job, poker seemed a viable but risky option. “There were a few times I was worried about being busted [by the police], but it was usually all right,” he said.

College students are exposed to gambling all the time. Social organizations on campus host Casino Nights, which are typically well-attended and feature prizes and vacations. Many Americans gamble on lottery tickets, which have become pervasive in the last 20 years. Football pools, poker nights, trips to Las Vegas and Atlantic City and easy access to quick betting over the Internet.

In the past decade, gambling in its various forms — from state-sponsored lotteries to gaudy casinos to horse racing — has spread across America, with Utah and Hawaii being the only states left that absolutely forbid gambling. Ten states now allow legalized casino gambling, and Native American reservations that are not governed by state laws harbor additional betting parlors.

The risk is the excitement. The higher the risk, the more excited gamblers feel. At a certain point, penny poker doesn’t have the same appeal.

“It doesn’t become an option” to gamble, said one student who asked not to be identified. “I must gamble, and for it to be fun, I must gamble big.”

Gambling is especially attractive to students, who are eager to try anything new and “dangerous,” said Audrey Messer, a psychologist at the University of New Mexico.

“College is all about trying new things and taking risks,” Messer said. “Plus, college students are newly freed from any sort of parental guidelines. This can be a heady sort of freedom.” And if students are psyched to break the rules, state governments are only too happy to make rules for them to break. Most states have laws making it illegal for people under the age of 21 to participate in gambling activities.

It’s no coincidence that college students are also more likely than the general population to overindulge in alcohol. The same desire to test limits and explore new situations leads students to gamble, Messer said.

“Gambling, like drinking, is not seen as something wrong, but something college kids do,” she said. “Because it can be so prevalent, at least in small social groups, it is hard for a person involved to know when they have crossed the line.”

Psychologist Valerie Lopez of Baltimore’s Compulsive Gambling Canter agrees that it is not the games but underlying factors in the person sending a person back to the game when it is obviously harmful.

“We must find out what led this intelligent, hardworking individual to do something that is so destructive to himself, to his family, to his work. It is so economically and emotionally destructive to so many people.”

But Sludikoff said there are reasons students should try gambling. “Not enough people are willing to risk and be entrepreneurs,” he said. “America does not reward people for being smart or good, but rewards people who are good at taking risks. Gambling gives people a structured way to learn how to take risks, so they will be better at it in the market place.”

Before you write off business school and head to Vegas, read Sean Mayall’s story. He owed bookies $10,000. “I had bill collectors calling all the time,” he said. “On many occasions, they were knocking on my door, knowing I was in there. I was just hiding.”

After trying to commit suicide, Mayall sought professional help.

“It’s as addictive as alcohol, cocaine or crack and you can get hooked,” said Mayall. “It’s not a joke.”

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