This research is aimed at unraveling the institutional representations of gamblers’ identities in the postmodern era. Although gambling has been widely researched in many fields such as psychology, sociology and cultural studies (e.g., Cosgrave, 2006; Kingma, 2010; McMillen, 1996; Petry, 2005), there has been a lack of scholarly inquiry vis-à-vis this topic among language researchers including discourse analysts. With the recent inauguration of two casino-based holiday resorts, Singapore provides a suitable platform for carrying out gambling-related academic research. Adopting the approach of critical discourse analysis (CDA), this study focuses on how gamblers’ identities are constructed through discourse as an artifact by social institutions. To this end, the present research capitalizes on the Bakhtinian (1981) notion of “dialogism” and makes use of multiple data sets in which different institutional “voices” are embedded. The data consist of newspaper forum letters, gamblers’ monologues released by a state gambling regulatory agency, and materials on problem/pathological gambling published by medical professionals. As a “public sphere” (Habermas, 1989) where a variety of “voices” about gamblers and gambling are accommodated, the newspaper forum letters serve as an opening scene for data analysis. From the 47 letters collected, three main groups of writers—(i) the non-affiliated contributors; (ii) the governing parties; (iii) the mental health-care professionals—have been identified. Adhering to the framework of Fairclough (2003), the analysis centers around the linguistic triggers for three social research issues: (i) legitimation; (ii) hegemony (aka “equivalence and difference”); (iii) “appearance versus reality.” It has been found that the non-affiliated contributors make heavy use of legitimation strategies. By contrast, legitimation strategies are much less prevalent among the governing parties. As for the mental health-care professionals, legitimation strategies are frequently found in their letters as a medium to foreground their in-group knowledge or expertise. To further investigate the government’s “voice,” a nationwide campaign initiated by the Singapore National Council on Problem Gambling has been used for analysis. Four gamblers’ speeches presented in this campaign have been examined on the basis of process types (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004), appraisal resources (Martin & White, 2005) and code choice. The findings show that the juxtaposed identities between the social gamblers and the recovering problem gamblers are symbolically mobilized by the state to create the stigmatized quality of “problematic gamblers” for the purpose of public governance. The interrogation of the medical “voice” has been performed along the direction of knowledge “recontextualization” (Kong, 2009; Linell, 2009). The data analysis involves texts from three sources: (i) a clinical handbook; (ii) a complimentary leaflet of a mental health-care unit; (iii) a self-help book from a popular profit-making series. The sociocognitive approach to discourse developed by van Dijk (1995, 2003b, 2005a, 2006, 2008a, 2008b, 2009, 2011, 2012) has been chosen as the principal analytic framework for this data set. The findings indicate that the text producers are continuously fiddling the boundaries between different types of knowledge (e.g., technical knowledge and “general-sociocultural” knowledge) with the goal of not only “popularizing” the medical paradigm, but also “colonizing” the “lifeworld” (Habermas, 1987). The significance of the research is primarily three-fold. First, bearing the undertone of deconstruction (Derrida, 1978), the current discourse-oriented inquiry about gamblers’ identities is an exemplar of how text and its ideological-cum-social implications are critically untangled and re-questioned. Second, the research offers concrete linguistic evidence on the essential complementary ontological presence of institutional power holders and the “docile bodies” (Foucault, 1977) for societal functioning and the maintenance of social stability. Third, a procedure for studying gamblers’ identities (or other institutional discursive constructs) is devised. With CDA as the overarching constituent, analytical concepts from a range of scholars are incorporated into the study (e.g., Fairclough, 2003; Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004; Hyland, 2005; Jeffries, 2010a, 2010b; Kong, 2009; Martin & White, 2005; van Dijk, 2008a; van Leeuwen, 2008).

A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts in partial fulfilment of the requirements degree of Masters of Recreation and Tourism in the Centre for Recreation and Tourism, at the University of Zululand, 2005. / Recreation is an emotional experience within an individual, resulting in a very personal reaction and attitude from the recreationist. The recreation activity is intended to deliver to the recreationist a sense of pleasure and personal worth. One such recreation activity is gambling. Gambling, according to Magi (2002), is the intentional act of betting with the sole purpose of winning or gaming. For many centuries gambling has been a form of recreation, however, it has always been and still is a controversial issue. This study has attempted to investigate the spending patterns of patrons at the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World with special reference to responsible gambling. This study examines the spending patterns of patrons, especially on the gaming floor with responsible gambling forming the core of the investigation. Some of the objectives of this study are: • To establish the main reasons why patrons visit the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World. • To evaluate the extent to which the level of education of patrons influences responsible gaming. • To establish the extent to which gaming patrons are aware of and practise responsible gambling. • To investigate the spending patterns of patrons at the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World in terms of the amount spent on gaming, entertainment, dining out, movies and the games room. • To reveal the socio-economic levels of patrons who frequent the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World. • To determine whether the patrons would frequent the casino more often if more entertainment and care was available for children. Utilising a sample of 116 respondents, this study revealed that only a moderate number of 42.2 percent of the patrons who were interviewed between the ages of 18 and above indicated that gaming was the main reason for visiting the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World. Approximately 38 percent of the patrons indicated that recreation was their main reason for visiting. Less than 8 percent of the patrons indicated that they preferred to watch movies and 11,2 percent indicated that dining was their main preference. A significant majority [75%] of the patrons indicated that they are aware of responsible gambling and only 6 percent gambled more than 75 percent of the money that they had with them during a single visit. Approximately 60 percent of the patrons acquired their knowledge on responsible gambling from the media and 23,3 percent indicated that they have no knowledge of responsible gambling. According to about 52 percent of the patrons the government should shoulder the responsibility of being responsible for the promotion of responsible gambling and a further 35 percent of the patrons felt that the casinos should be responsible for the promotion of responsible gambling. With regard to educational levels, those patrons with matriculation and above gambled more in each of the spending categories. Approximately less than half [46%] of the patrons indicated that they earn more than RIO 000 a month. However there is a significant number [8%] of the patrons at the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World that belong to the less than R3 000 a month category. The age group that frequents the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment world the most is the 26 - 45 year age group and the below 25 year age group visits in smaller numbers. Below 10 percent of the patrons are from Durban and the surrounding areas. Approximately 15 percent of the patrons come from provinces outside KwaZulu-Natal. The largest percentage (35,6 percent) of the patrons are from the Durban North (Kwa Mashu, Inanda, Phoenix, Mount Edgecombe) area. The majority of patrons also felt that they would definitely visit the Sun Coast Casino and Entertainment World more often if more entertainment was available for the children. Generally the below 45 year age group felt more strongly about the need for more entertainment for children than the patrons who fell into the above 46 year age group. This study makes several recommendations, some of which are: • Organizations that assist problem gamblers need more funding. • Free drinks, free slot machine vouchers and most valued guest cards should be banned. • The general public must be informed of responsible gambling. • Marketing in the gaming industry should be minimal or banned. • More research should be undertaken in the field of tourism gaming. It is very important to mention that this study has revealed that literature and information on responsible gambling is very scarce and that there is a need to make such information available to the gaming people. Literature that combines recreation and gaining is also very scarce and there is a need for additional research in this field of study. A recommendation that stands out very clearly is the need to educate the general public on the concept and meaning of responsible gambling, as well as all related benefits of notion.

No description available.

The notion of structural effects in gaming machine play is increasingly gaining importance in the gambling literature. The development of gaming machines in Australia has seen a large number of machine characteristics become an inherent part of poker machine play. However, there is an absence of studies examining their effect. Two studies were undertaken examining the relationship between the structural characteristics of poker machines and player expenditure patterns. The first study examined aggregated player data from over 1000 poker machines. The results suggest that both measures of expenditure utilised, stake size and net profit, are related to structural characteristics. This finding provided a foundation for the theoretical discussion of individual player behaviour encompassing both learning and cognitive paradigms. The second study examined the expenditure patterns of 533 individual players in an ecologically valid setting. The results indicate that player stake size is related to certain structural characteristics but player net loss is not. These results failed to support the predictions of operant conditioning. A model of structural effects is proposed and the theoretical implications for future studies of gaming behaviour are discussed / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Thesis (M.S.W.)--University of Hong Kong, 2004.

Thesis (M.Sc.)--University of Guelph (Canada), 2005. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Nevada, Reno, 2007. / "December, 2007." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 72-77). Online version available on the World Wide Web.

Thesis (M.A.)--California State University Channel Islands, 2008. / Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Masters Of Science in Mathematics. Title from PDF t.p. (viewed October 25, 2009).

Thesis (M.P.A.)--Kutztown University of Pennsylvania, 1995. / Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 45-06, page: 2924. Typescript. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. S. W.)--University of Hong Kong, 2004. / Also available in print.