Comorbid behavioral and substance-related addictions in young population with and without gambling disorder

Abstract

People with gambling disorder (GD) often experience co-occurring addictive behaviors, especially at young ages. This paper aims at examining cognitive biases, emotion dysregulation, and coping strategies in people with and without GD, as well as comparing the comorbid addictions profiles of those in clinical versus community-based sites. A sample from the general population comprising 250 adolescents and young individuals, and a clinical sample of 31 patients with problematic gambling or GD were recruited. Results showed that GD severity was positively related to alcohol abuse, drugs abuse (in the women group) and buying-shopping (in the men group) in the community sample. In the clinical sample, GD severity was positively related to gaming and instant messaging, and the highest levels in cognitive biases were related to gambling behaviors. Also, the highest emotion dysregulation scores and the highest scores for difficulties in coping strategies were associated with the comorbid presence of GD and other addictions, closely followed by GD presence without other addictions. These results provide evidence of the existence of underlying risk factors shared by GD and its comorbid addictions, which suggests the understanding and treatment of co-occurring addictions in a comprehensive rather than individual manner.