Posted on May 3, 2006

Zach learned to play poker in sixth grade, and at 14 he's been playing for money with family and friends a couple of Friday nights a month.
   “I won $500 from my family one time,” he quickly volunteered when a gathering of teens in downtown Saratoga Springs was asked recently about their knowledge of gambling.
   Zach, who spoke on condition he not be further identified, watches the World Series of Poker on ESPN “for tips and stuff.”
   At the University at Albany, meanwhile, 20-year-old Matt Gianquinto has taken to Texas Hold 'Em, the fast-paced poker that has swept college campuses across the nation, thanks in part to ESPN.
   “I had never heard of Texas Hold 'Em until I got to college,” said Gianquinto, who grew up on Long Island.
   Students and counselors at local colleges such as UAlbany and Hudson Valley Community College say the game is ubiquitous, particularly among male students. Games are played in cafeterias, dorm rooms and fraternity houses, and students go to Turning Stone Casino in Verona and play at thousands of Web sites.
   Could high school students like Zach or some of the host of college players become problem gamblers, the kind who will encounter problems like huge debt, blown relationships and poor grades?
   It's too soon to tell. But psychologists, counselors and former gamblers say the current popularity of poker and other gambling on campuses and among high schoolers could lead to trouble down the road.
   “I wouldn't be terribly surprised if we saw 8 to 10 percent of pathological gaming,” said Joseph Schaefer, an anthropologist at Union College in Schenectady and director of the Alcohol and Other Drug Prevention Program for the state university system. “That means that probably 90 percent are enjoying it socially and having a good time. Ten percent is what we see with other addictions.”
   Pathological gamblers will go broke before they stop betting, and will then beg, borrow or steal to keep going, in an addiction many counselors compare to alcoholism.
   “The potential downside risks for an individual can be fairly dire,” said adolescent gambling researcher Dr. Jeffrey Derevensky of McGill University in Montreal, who spoke Thursday at a conference on adolescent gambling in Saratoga Springs.
   Seventy percent of middle and high school boys in the Saratoga Springs area and 24 percent of girls consider gambling “cool,” according to a survey done last year by the Prevention Council of Saratoga County, which sponsored the conference.
   The survey also found onethird of seventh-graders think they could make a living gambling, like 19 th century riverboat gamblers or the professionals they see in the World Series of Poker.
   Nationally, an Annenberg Public Policy Center study last year found 42 percent of those ages 14 to 22 play cards at least once a month. That jumps to 50 percent for all college students.
   Among those who played at least once a week, Annenberg found 12 percent have played for money not just with friends, but at one of the thousands of poker Web sites open 24 hours a day on their computers.
   “There's kids who stay up until 3 a.m. playing poker,” said a college student named Shawn.
   Counselors say young people are more at risk than adults to become gambling addicts, thanks to immature judgment, impulsivity, susceptibility to peer pressure, and a belief nothing bad can happen to them.
   In New York state, those under age 18 aren't supposed to be gambling at all.
   But the state lottery, race tracks and Indian-run casinos such as Turning Stone are advertised as commonly as soft drinks and pizza, with promises of riches and fun. Cable television poker tournaments with expert card players and celebrities add to the “cool” factor, and episodes highlighting poker have appeared recently in such popular television shows as “House,” “Lost,” and “Desperate Housewives.”
   “We're finding it's very similar around the world. Gambling is expanding like crazy. It becomes more and more socially acceptable, and as it becomes more socially acceptable more adolescents take it up,” said Derevensky, who is co-director of the International Center for Study and Prevention of Youth Gambling Problems.
   “The problem with every addiction is that the line is there somewhere, and you don't know where it is until you've gone to the other side,” said Judy Ekman, executive director of The Prevention Council, a nonprofit agency that educates high school students about risky behaviors.
   “They typically have a high IQ, and they're highly social,” said Michelle Hadden, the Prevention Council's gambling prevention program coordinator. “We don't [publicize] it, but that's the profile.”
HIGHLY POPULAR
   “I know a number of kids who are absolutely hooked on Texas Hold 'Em,” said Dr. Richard De-Martino, a psychologist who is student advocate at Saratoga Springs High School and also has a private practice in Clifton Park. “In my private practice, I'm seeing a number of adolescents who may be developing a problem.”
   In high school cafeterias across the region, it's common to see kids who are “bored” getting out a deck of cards. In many cases, staff looks the other way unless the game is so intense it's drawing a crowd.
   Some high schools, however, ban cards. At Shenendehowa High School in Clifton Park, there's a firmly enforced policy against card-playing on school grounds, even when no money is involved.
   “Anything with the appearance of gambling is considered a violation of our code of conduct,” said Shenendehowa spokeswoman Kelly DeFeciani. “Yes, it's a problem. There have been issues with students gambling.”
   But is it really more popular than in the past?
   Good information is hard to come by. The most recent reliable statistics are from 1998, before the current boom and widespread acceptance of Internet gambling. At that time, a state-funded survey estimated 14 percent of New York youths ages 13-17 were at risk of developing a gambling problem.
   The state Office of Alcohol and Substance Abuse Services, which also funds gambling-prevention programs, is in the process of doing a new survey.
ONLINE BOOM
   Internet-based gambling sites are supposed to be for adults only, but in practice, anyone with access to a credit card can play. Internet poker sites are generally based overseas, beyond the reach of U.S. laws.
   Those sites are wildly profitable. The Internet gambling industry saw betting increase by $1.7 billion, or 42 percent, from 2002 to 2003, according to the research group Christiansen Capital Advisors. Internet gambling consultant Michael Tew, based in Manhattan, estimated there has been a threefold increase in college students who play poker online.
   The revenue from online betting around the world is expected to hit $15 billion this year and $22 billion by 2009, according to Christiansen Capital Advisors. The company is a leading market researcher for the gaming and wagering industry.
   “I have friends who play online, I've played online a little bit,” Gianquinto said. “I lost 50 dollars in 10 minutes once.”
   Tew said the online sites have made Texas Hold 'Em the most popular form of poker.
   “What the Internet has done is brought the game of Texas Hold 'Em to the forefront of gaming,” Tew said. “It's very quickly made it one of the most popular forms of gambling among legal young adults.”
   Nearly every adult with a gambling addiction started as a youngster, Hadden said. “For pathological gamblers, the average age they start is 10 to 12,” she said.
STARTED AT 12
   Nick Perotta of Saratoga Springs, a 57-year-old recovering compulsive gambler, grew up in Mechanicville and started gambling when he was 12. “My family, all my friends, everybody gambled a little bit,” he said.
   But he had a problem, and by age 30, he says, he'd hit rock bottom, and begun attending Gamblers Anonymous meetings. Now, he's ready to go into schools and talk about his experiences.
   “Today, what I see is the glorification of a lot of things that might get kids interested,” Perotta said. “You turn on the TV, it's on six different channels. Turn the computer on, it's any time, any day, money or no money.”
   For those with a problem, it becomes more about the action than the money.
   “Usually, there's a pattern of winning at least some of the time. It's what psychologists call intermittent reinforcement. It's very difficult behavior to break,” Derevensky said. “I had a 17-year-old in my office saying, ‘What a rush! It's better than sex!' ”
   Problem gambling treatment programs whose clients used to be almost exclusively adult now see a significant number of college students.
   “We're receiving calls from parents shocked their teenager is using a credit card to gamble on the Internet,” said Maureen Corbett, director of the Center for Problem Gambling.
   Gianquinto regards himself as a cautious player, but acknowledges not everyone around him in the Albany college scene is.
   “I have friends of friends, they take their entire paycheck and go to Turning Stone,” Gianquinto said. “Yeah, Turning Stone is big. I have friends that go there every weekend.”
   The casino staged the March Madness Poker Tournament which, like an upcoming tournament in May, featured various forms of no-limit Texas Hold 'Em. Three tournaments there in March were part of the eliminations that will lead to the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas this summer, and possible television fame.
   “Texas Hold 'Em poker has really become incredibly popular because of the multimedia attention to it, and the ease of the game, and because it's fun. There is a lot of entertainment value to it,” said Schaefer, the anthropologist at Union College.