Boredom draws seniors to casinos, gambling

People gamble to win, right?

Not necessarily, especially if the people you're talking about are senior citizens.

Seniors -- defined as people aged 65 and older -- gamble primarily because they don't have much else to do, according to a panel of experts speaking Thursday at the National Conference on Problem Gambling.

Seniors turn to gambling in search of excitement, glamour, and sometimes even a way to cope with the loss of a loved one, participants said. And after a life of hard work, they feel they've earned the right to have fun.

"I go for the life, it's exciting," said one compulsive gambler, a 69-year old women. Her comments were reported by a panelist who as a psychiatrist treats older addicted gamblers. "It's something to do, and I even win some times."

In fact, many seniors face a serious moral dilemma when it comes to gambling, said Pat Fowler, executive director of the Florida Council on Compulsive Gambling. Raised in a time of high moral standards, they regard gambling winnings as "dirty money," she said. But faced with little else to do, they turn to gambling anyway as a way to alleviate their boredom, Fowler said.

"I've seen that dilemma in seniors that gamble," Fowler said. "What we're seeing is a real dilemma in our society regarding gambling."

Problem gambling among seniors is growing in importance primarily because the number of seniors is growing, Fowler said.

"There is enormous growth in the senior population in general ... with the coming of age of the Baby Boom population," Fowler said. "And, coupled with that is the increased lifespan that seniors enjoy today."

Over the next 20 years, the number of people aged 65 and above will nearly double, from 55 million today, to 95 million, Fowler said.

Fowler and other panelists said seniors as a demographic group share a number of characteristics that make them make them particularly vulnerable to the lure of gambling, even if they never set foot in a casino in their younger years: their retirement income is steady, they have a lot of free time on their hands, and they don't have much of anything to do.

Casinos offer a safe, exciting environment, where seniors are made to feel special, Fowler said.

"The gambling industry acknowledges that a large percentage of their clientele includes seniors today," she said.

But seniors also face a number of challenges not shared by the general population. Seniors frequently lose loved ones, leaving them alone physically and emotionally. Many find themselves in unfamiliar circumstances, having just retired from a job, or recently moved to a new part of the country.

The stress of dealing with these challenges makes many seniors particularly prone to gambling disorders, said Dennis McNeilly, a psychologist who is assistant professor of psychiatry at Creighton University and the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.

Many seniors turn to gambling as a way to cope with the changes rocking their lives, McNeilly said.

"Gambling provides an escape, a way to cope," agreed Betty George, executive director of the North American Training Institute, a gambling treatment center.

McNeilly detailed several cases he has treated, keeping names anonymous, as a way of demonstrating common patterns in older addicted gamblers. One woman, 79, turned to gambling as an escape when her husband's health began to decline. A man, 67, started going to casinos looking for excitement after his mother-in-law moved into the house.

In a survey of nearly 7,000 seniors he conducted in the Omaha-Council Bluffs area, McNeilly found that casinos were the number one recreational activity among those 65 and older who had access to transportation.

When asked if they gamble to win, seniors say yes, McNeilly said. But when simply asked their reasons for gambling, those same seniors tell McNeilly and his colleagues that they are primarily looking for something to do, he said.

"I think, by and large, most go for the involvement aspect," McNeilly said.

Fowler said many seniors honestly don't want to win.

"On the one hand, they feel for them that it's morally wrong," Fowler said.

One walker-confined man told Fowler that, "to win the money would have been bothersome to him because he considered it dirty money," she said.

The same factor that has installed a moral aversion to gambling in many seniors -- the fact that they were raised during the Great Depression, when moral prohibitions against gambling were stricter -- also works against addicted seniors who need help, McNeilly said. Raised to believe people are helped best by helping themselves, many gambling addicted seniors are reluctant to seek help for their compulsive behavior, he said.

Treating seniors addicted to gambling is more problematic than identifying the reasons seniors are prone to gambling addiction, participants said. One solution is suggested by McNeilly's research. In 10 years of clinical practice in Omaha, he never saw a single case of addicted gambling disorder until last year, when he saw 25. Riverboat gambling was first legalized across the river, in Iowa, about three years ago, he said.

McNeilly's findings suggest that one way to treat addicted gambling among seniors is to prohibit gambling altogether. Because such an extreme measure is highly unlikely, the best way to prevent seniors from turning to gambling is to create other things for seniors to do, Fowler said.

"We as a society must assume responsibility for the lack of meaningful activities available to the senior citizen," Fowler said.

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