Online poker has become a world-wide phenomenon. Millions of people around the world can sit at a virtual table on any particular gambling site, and play cards for real money. This addiction contains a psychological component, and an ease of access using the internet component. You can play in a tournament with hundreds of other people or play heads-up with a random gambler from across the globe. What makes online gambling such an interesting concept is there is no physical cash or actual poker chips being handled. For some, since the money is all wire-transferred, this makes it seem as if you are not really playing with “real money” sometimes. Also, it is unbelievably easier to access the internet website to gamble than travel to an actual casino. These are clearly major dangers of online gambling addiction.
A large number of people suffer from PIU or problematic internet use. With regards to online gambling, PIU is a relevant term to use when a person’s time on the internet is negatively affecting their life, and this does not just refer to losing money via gambling. Caplan (2004) identifies two types of users who likely suffer from PUI: Excessive users spend an overly-excessive amount of time online; Compulsive users can not control his or her own internet use and experiences guilt as a result. The following can be examples of both types of users: not spending time with friends/family, or feeling the need to log-on to a gambling website while at work or school. Clearly, online gambling addiction can be linked to PUI, and the addiction can have extremely damaging effects on a person’s life.
Caplan’s (2004) major theory of PIU and Psychosocial well-being relates. Some people may feel more comfortable gambling online, because it is not as intimidating as trying to “read” someone’s “poker-face”. The online-enviroment might be construed as a more relaxing environment for some gamblers. In other word’s a person’s individual differences or personal issues might dictate a person’s low-social competence and thus a preference for using the internet which is not a stressful environment for this person. Another perspective along the theory framework is that people with low social competence will compulsively gamble to avoid awkward social interactions with other people in real-life, and instead, prefer to interact with the other gamblers online in somewhat of a social community.
Wallace mentions general factors relating to Internet properties that contribute to PIU. One that is applicable is the maintenance of virtual presence. An addicted gambler will often find a group of others he likes to play with and will get to know these people. This is a similar concept to a friends having a weekley poker game in ftf, except online oftentimes you do not "really" know these people you are playing with. You want to keep your reputation as a player in tact and you want to keep your virtual presence, oftentimes due to personal insecurities (individual differences).
I’ll leave you off with a relevant quote from the movie “Two for the Money” (2005):
"You're a lemon. Like a bad car. There is something... there is something inherently defective in you, and you, and you, and me, and all of us. We're all lemons. We look like everyone else, but what makes us different is our defect. See, most gamblers, when they go to gamble, they go to win. When we go to gamble, we go to lose. Subconsciously. Me, I never feel better than when they're raking the chips away; not bringing them in. And everyone here knows what I'm talking about. Hell, even when we win it's just a matter of time before we give it all back. But when we lose, that's another story. When we lose, and I'm talking about the kind of loss that makes your asshole pucker to the size of a decimal point - you know what I mean - You've just recreated the worst possible nightmare this side of malignant cancer, for the twentieth goddamn time; and you're standing there and you suddenly realise, Hey, I'm still... here. I'm still breathing. I'm still alive. Us lemons, we fuck shit up all the time on purpose. Because we constantly need to remind ourselves we're alive. Gambling's not your problem. It's this fucked up need to feel something. To convince yourself you exist. That's the problem". Source: IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0417217/quotes
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Internet poker is a great topic; very relevant to our generation, even considering the new, highly restrictive legislation passed recently. While online gambling in general can be extremely addicting and destructive, an interesting dimension is that it does create big winners. Everyone seems to know a guy who knows a guy who’s made some massive sum through online poker. In this sort of circumstance, does it still qualify as problematic internet use? Presumably the players who are making big money are spending countless hours in front of their computers, but if they’re making a substantial amount of money from doing so, does that cease to be problematic and instead become beneficial, at least in an economic sense? In the “real world,” it doesn’t usually seem to be the case that professional poker players are considered to be addicted to gambling. I would thus ultimately propose that a player’s degree of success (or failure) determines whether or not internet use is problematic.
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