This book provides an overview of the state of the art in research on and treatment of gambling disorder. As a behavioral addiction, gambling disorder is of increasing relevance to the field of mental health. Research conducted in the last decade has yielded valuable new insights into the characteristics and etiology of gambling disorder, as well as effective treatment strategies. The different chapters of this book present detailed information on the general concept of addiction as applied to gambling, the clinical characteristics, epidemiology and comorbidities of gambling disorder, as well as typical cognitive distortions found in patients with gambling disorder. In addition, the book includes chapters discussing animal models and the genetic and neurobiological underpinnings of the disorder. Further, it is examining treatment options including pharmacological and psychological intervention methods, as well as innovative new treatment approaches. The book also discusses relevant similarities to and differences with substance-related disorders and other behavioral addictions. Lastly, it examines gambling behavior from a cultural perspective, considers possible prevention strategies and outlines future perspectives in the field.
About the Author: Andreas Heinz is Professor of Psychiatry and Director of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy of the Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany. He studied medicine, philosophy and anthropology at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Freie Universität Berlin and at Howard University, Washington DC. He worked with Markku Linnoila and Daniel Weinberger as a special volunteer at the Clinical Brain Disorders Branch, NIH. He recently was awarded with a Leibniz Chair of the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology Magdeburg for excellent research in neuroscience as well as a Karl-Jaspers guest professorship at the University of Oldenburg. His research focuses on learning mechanisms and their modulation by monoaminergic neurotransmission. This includes effects of dopaminergic neurotransmission and genotype on reward prediction and processing and of serotonergic neurotransmission on processing of aversive stimuli and negative mood states. He applies multimodal imaging techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging, positron emission tomography and spectroscopy. In cooperation with the Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience Berlin, he uses computational approaches to model behavior and to assess multiple genotype effects on the multimodal imaging data. A second research focus is on social exclusion stress and transcultural psychiatry.
Nina Romanczuk-Seiferth is a clinical psychologist, psychotherapist and neuroscientist. Currently, she is a Professor of Neurobiology of the Mind and Neuropsychotherapy at Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany, where she works as head psychologist at the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy. Her research group "Emotional Neuroscience" focuses on the neurobiological correlates of emotion and motivation in psychological disorders as well as its implications for psychotherapy. Within this scope, Nina Romanczuk-Seiferth works on gambling disorder and other behavioral addictions. Beside her research activities and her clinical practice, Nina Romanczuk-Seiferth is also an academic lecturer and instructor in her professional field. After her studies of psychology and philosophy at the Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, Nina Romanczuk-Seiferth pursued her doctoral studies at the RWTH Aachen and the Research Center Jülich, Germany. Her thesis dealt with the neuronal correlates of emotions in schizophrenia, especially in the early course of the disease, and was supported by the reputable fellowship for doctoral students of the German National Academic Foundation.
Marc N. Potenza is a board-certified psychiatrist with sub-specialty training in addiction psychiatry. He has trained at Yale University receiving a combined BS/MS with Honors in Molecular Biochemistry and Biophysics and a PhD in Cell Biology, the latter concurrent with the MD through the Medical Scientist Training Program. He completed internship, psychiatric residency and addiction psychiatry fellowship training at Yale. Currently, he is a Professor of Psychiatry, Child Study and Neuroscience at the Yale University School of Medicine where he is Director of the Problem Gambling Clinic, the Center of Excellence in Gambling Research, and the Women and Addictive Disorders Core of Women's Health Research at Yale. He is also a Senior Scientist at the Connecticut Council on Problem Gambling. He is on the editorial boards of more than ten journals (including editor-in-chief of Current Addiction Reports) and has received multiple national and international awards for excellence in research and clinical care. He is the Board of Directors for the National Council on Problem Gambling. He has consulted to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, National Registry of Effective Programs, National Institutes of Health, American Psychiatric Association and World Health Organization on matters of addiction. He has participated in two DSM-5 research work groups, addressing topics relating to gambling, impulse control, and addiction.
