Mentalizing Failures, Emotional Dysregulation, and Cognitive Distortions Among Adolescent Problem Gamblers

Abstract

Over the past decade, several studies have investigated the relationship between cognitive distortions and emotion regulation among adolescent gamblers, demonstrating the exacerbating role of alcohol consumption when co-occurring with gambling problems. An important construct, that to date has been largely neglected, is mentalizing (i.e. the ability to reflect on one's own and others' mental states). The aim of the present study was (for the first time) to investigate the relative contribution of mentalization, emotional dysregulation, cognitive distortions, and alcohol consumption among adolescent gamblers. A total of 396 students (69.2% females) aged 14-19 years were recruited from secondary schools in Southern Italy. Assessment measures included the South Oaks Gambling Screen Revised for Adolescents (SOGS-RA), the Reflective Functioning Questionnaire (RFQ-8), the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS), the Gambling Related Cognitions Scale (GRCS), and the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT). Regression analysis showed that, along with male gender, the best predictors of adolescent gambling were scores on two GRCS subscales (i.e., 'inability to stop gambling' and 'interpretative bias'), the RFQ-8's 'uncertainty about mental states' dimension, and the DERS 'impulse control difficulties' factor, with the overall model explaining more than one-third of the total variance. The results clearly indicated that, along with gambling-related cognitive distortions, uncertainty about mental states, and difficulties remaining in control of one's behavior when experiencing negative emotions contributed significantly to problematic gambling among adolescents.

Short-Term Effectiveness of the Youth Gambling Prevention Program “Who Really Wins?”—Results from the First National Implementation

“…When it comes to cognitive distortions, they are continuously confirmed as significant predictors of problem gambling and as a fundamental part of problem gambling symptomatology [ 70 , 85 , 86 , 87 , 88 , 89 , 90 ]. Consequently, approaches that challenge cognitive distortions and provide educational corrections have shown success in the treatment of problem gambling [ 85 , 91 ].…”

Alexithymia and Emotion Regulation Strategies in Adolescent Gamblers with and Without At-Risk Profiles

“…However, other studies have suggested that not negative affect but the desire to gamble is what predicts gambling behavior (Quilty et al, 2017 ). In this line, it has been highlighted that adolescents’ difficulties in emotion regulation are related to difficulties to control their behavior when experiencing negative emotional states, and may thus promote gambling problems (Ciccarelli et al, 2020 ). Moreover, it has recently been found that individuals with a gambling disorder expressed less implicit emotions, such as anger and anxiety, and expressed more explicit emotions than non-gamblers (Guerrero-Vaca et al, 2020 ).…”

Childhood emotional abuse and problematic social networking sites use in a sample of Italian adolescents: The mediating role of deficiencies in self‐other differentiation and uncertain reflective functioning

“…Thus, reflective functioning is a basic facet of human interaction and contributes to the development of stable interpersonal networks (Sundqvist, 2010). Conversely, uncertain reflective functioning has been associated with emotion dysregulation (e.g., Morosan et al, 2020); difficulties with impulse control, self-monitoring, and self-agency (Cosenza et al, 2019;; alexithymia (Badoud et al, 2015); and various forms of psychopathology (Luyten et al, 2020), including substance abuse and addictive disorders (Ciccarelli et al, 2020;Handeland et al, 2019;Möller et al (2017).…”