The Study Of Psychological And Behavioral Characteristics Of Problem Lottery Buyers And Its Psychological Mechanism

Problem gamblers refer to those lottery consumers who make destructive influences toward individuals, families and society caused by purchasing lottery. With the rapid development of sports lottery in China, the hidden trouble begins to appear that is the breeding of problem gambler which causes concern for expert researchers in psychopathology, psychology and clinical medicine. In fact, the large amounts of academic fruits of problem gambling study has been achieved internationally, however, domestic sports lottery research mainly pays attention to the theoretical and practical issue,regulatory problems and so on, the psychological and behavioral characteristics of problem gamblers is hardly discussed before.Firstly, in the basis of some related researches, the diagnosis criteria for problem gamblers is developed. Secondly, all subjects are divided into two groups (problem gamblers and non-problem gamblers) based on the verified diagnosis criteria for problem gamblers, and the characteristics of two groups are analyzed. Thirdly, in the basis of the literature review, this research extracts the influential factors of purchasing lottery for problem gamblers and tests the model hypothesis by using correlation analysis and structural equation. Finally, the study analyzes the case on inherent mental process of problem gamblers’formation and development based on the first three researches.The major findings and conclusion:(1)Development of Diagnosis Criteria for Problem Gamblers in Sports Lottery.The problem gamblers’diagnosis criteria consist of12items and5factors (continued and repeated purchasing behaviour, cognitive bias, out of control; abstinence; actus reus). Each entry is awarded one mark and the cutoff point of the problem gamblers scale was6.The problem gamblers’diagnosis criteria have a relatively reliability and validity by means of Delphi, item discrimination analyses, criterion validity analyses, which can be regarded as a research tool.(2)Lottery behavioral characteristics in Problem Gamblers.Problem gamblers is the subgroups of lottery consumers, they shows the characteristics of lottery purchasing:three low (low income, low education levels, low social status), three high (high purchase frequency, high purchase expenditure, high purchase time), three lacks (lack of social support, lack of security, lack of self-control).(3)The influential factors of purchasing lottery of the problem gamblers.The purchasing lottery addiction has significantly positive correlation with sensation seeking, economic utility and unhealthy information dissemination, but negative with family economics. Economic utility is a partial mediator between family economics, unhealthy information dissemination and purchasing lottery addiction.(4)The psychological mechanism of problem lottery buyers. Monetary motive is a key factor in the process of purchasing sports lottery of problem lottery buyers, its course and development goes through four stages:initial stage; continuous stage; struggle stage; addiction stage. One followed "interactions among individual needs and triggersâ†'purchasing motiveâ†'purchasing behaviorâ†'mood modificationâ†'controlâ†'loss of controlâ†'interactions among increase investment and monetary motiveâ†'overconfidence or regretâ†'interactions among continuous investment and monetary motiveâ†'purchasing lottery addictionâ†'negative impact".