Casino Drink Policies: Limiting Third-Party Liability

In their efforts to provide an atmosphere or hospitality to their casino customers, many operators will provide complimentary alcoholic beverage service. This practice is fraught with liability, particularly in venues outside of Nevada. Conscientious operators must take every precaution to mitigate the possibility of lawsuit.

The Nevada Gaming Debt Collection Experience

In the discussion - The Nevada Gaming Debt Collection Experience - by Larry D. Strate, Assistant Professor, College of Business and Economics at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Assistant Professor Strate initially outlines the article by saying: “Even though Nevada has had over a century of legalized gaming experience, the evolution of gaming debt collection has been a recent phenomenon. The author traces that history and discusses implications of the current law.” The discussion opens with a comparison between the gaming industries of New Jersey/Atlantic City, and Las Vegas, Nevada. This contrast serves to point out the disparities in debt handling between the two. “There are major differences in the development of legalized gaming for both Nevada and Atlantic City. Nevada has had over a century of legalized gambling; Atlantic City, New Jersey, has completed a decade of its operation,” Strate informs you. “Nevada's gaming industry has been its primary economic base for many years; Atlantic City's entry into gaming served as a possible solution to a social problem. Nevada's processes of legalized gaming, credit play, and the collection of gaming debts were developed over a period of 125 years; Atlantic City's new industry began with gaming, gaming credit, and gaming debt collection simultaneously in 1976 [via the New Jersey Casino Control Act] .” The irony here is that Atlantic City, being the younger venue, had or has a better system for handling debt collection than do the historic and traditional Las Vegas properties. Many of these properties were duplicated in New Jersey, so the dichotomy existed whereby New Jersey casinos could recoup debt while their Nevada counterparts could not. “It would seem logical that a "territory" which permitted gambling in the early 1800’s would have allowed the Nevada industry to collect its debts as any other legal enterprise. But it did not,” Strate says. Of course, this situation could not be allowed to continue and Strate outlines the evolution. New Jersey tactfully benefitted from Nevada’s experience. “The fundamental change in gaming debt collection came through the legislature as the judicial decisions had declared gaming debts uncollectable by either a patron or a casino,” Strate informs you. “Nevada enacted its gaming debt collection act in 1983, six years after New Jersey,” Strate points out. One of the most noteworthy paragraphs in the entire article is this: “The fundamental change in 1983, and probably the most significant change in the history of gaming in Nevada since the enactment of the Open Gaming Law of 1931, was to allow non-restricted gaming licensees* to recover gaming debts evidenced by a credit instrument. The new law incorporated previously litigated terms with a new one, credit instrument.” The term is legally definable and gives Nevada courts an avenue of due process.

A relação entre transtorno da insônia e funções executivas em adultos

The insomnia disorder is defined as a difficulty initiating or maintaining sleep or waking up earlier than expected unable to return to sleep, followed by a feeling of nonrestorative and poor quality sleep, present for at least three months, with consequences on daytime functioning. Studies have shown that insomnia affects cognitive function, especially executive functions. However, researches that sought to investigate the relationship between primary insomnia and executive functioning were quite inconsistent from a methodological point of view, especially in regard to the variability of the used methods, the heterogeneity of diagnostic criteria for insomnia and the control of sleep altering drugs. In this sense, the present study aimed to investigate the relationship between insomnia and executive functions in adults. The participants were 29 people, from both genders, aged 20-55 years old. Participants were divided into three groups, one composed of 10 people with primary insomnia who used sleep medication (GIM), nine people with primary insomnia who did not use medication (GInM) and 10 healthy people who composed the control group (CG). The research was conducted in two stages. The first one involved a diagnostic evaluation for insomnia disorder through a clinical interview and the application of the following protocols: the Athens Insomnia Scale, the Insomnia Severity Index, Sleep Journal (for 14 days), Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), the Stanford Sleepiness Test, depression and anxiety Beck inventories, and Lipp’s Iventory of stress symptoms for adults. After this stage, the evaluation of executive functions was performed by applying a battery of neuropsychological tests composed by the following tests: Wisconsin, Stoop Test, Colored trails Test, the Tower of London Test, Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) and WAIS III subtest digit span, which measured selective attention, inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility, planning, problem solving, decision making and working memory, respectively. The results showed that insomniacs (GIM and GInM) showed higher sleep latency, shorter sleep duration and lower sleep efficiency compared to the CG. In regard to the performance in executive functions, no statistically significant difference between groups was observed in the evaluated modalities. However, the data show evidence that, compared to GInM and GC, the performance of GIM was lower on tasks that required quick responses and changes in attention focus. On the other hand, GInM, when compared to GIM and GC, showed a better performance on tasks involving cognitive flexibility. Furthermore, impaired sleep measures were correlated with the worst performance of insomniacs in all components evaluated. In conclusion, people with the insomnia disorder showed a performance similar to healthy people’s in components of the executive functioning. Thus, one can infer that there is a relationship between primary insomnia and executive functions in adults.

England's Yellow Peril: Sinophobia and the Great War

As England suffered heavy casualties at the front during World War One, the nation closed ranks against outsiders at home. England sought to reaffirm its racial dominance at the heart of the empire, and the Chinese in London became the principal scapegoat for anti-foreign sentiment. A combination of propaganda and popular culture, from the daily paper to the latest theatre sensation, fanned the flames of national resentment into a raging Sinophobia. Opium smoking, gambling and interracial romance became synonymous with London's Limehouse Chinatown, which was exoticised by Sax Rohmer's evil mastermind Fu Manchu and Thomas Burke's tales of lowlife love. England's Yellow Peril exploded in the midst of a catastrophic war and defined the representation of Chinese abroad in the decades to come.

Asumiendo las consecuencias negativas de la adicción al juego

La adicción al juego no sólo se caracteriza por la pérdida de control ante el juego, sino que esta conducta tiende a generar problemas en los diferentes ámbitos de la vida del ludópata. Por ello, este aspecto se recoge en el Manual diagnóstico y estadístico de los trastornos mentales-5 (DSM-V) como uno de los criterios para realizar su valoración diagnóstica. Objetivo: describir y analizar los diferentes elementos que conforman la compleja problemática aparejada a esta adicción y que pueden terminar en situaciones de exclusión social. Método: Se opta por una metodología cualitativa que se ajusta mejor a los intereses del estudio. Como técnica se ha seleccionado la historia de vida, instrumento de evaluación que permite conocer la verdadera magnitud del problema desde el punto de vista de los afectados. Resultados. De manera general, se ha descubierto que ser ludópata tiene muchos más consecuentes que el problema económico evidente. No debemos despreciar las implicaciones de esta conducta a otros niveles: familiar, laboral, legal y social, que pueden considerarse, a medio plazo, como factores mucho más execrables que el del mero gasto económico. Conclusión. Es fácil avistar que los graves problemas que acarrea la adicción al juego son capaces de desmembrar el proyecto vital del ludópata y el de su familia. Todo vale, aunque para ello tenga que jugarse su puesto de trabajo, su casa, su familia, sus amistades, su estatus social y su propia dignidad.

Entretenimientos, fiestas, juegos y placeres en la corte de los reyes de Aragón en el siglo xiv Steffano

Este trabajo estudia la presencia e importancia de las diversiones y el placer en distintos momentos de la vida de la corte de los reyes de Aragón: las prostitutas, dirigidas por el rey Arlot, la música, el juego, el baile o los juglares, observando el aumento de su presencia a lo largo del siglo xiv, con el correlativo aumento de los gastos. También se observa el incremento en el lujo y la complejidad de estas actividades y la siempre mayor presencia de elementos espectaculares como bestias, carros, figuras alegóricas y otros entremeses en coronaciones, bodas o entradas reales, todos ellos aspectos de la progresiva glorificación de la monarquía.

Portrait des habitudes de jeu de patients atteints de la maladie de Parkinson

Le risque de développer un problème de jeu chez les personnes atteintes de la maladie de Parkinson (MP) est de plus en plus documenté. Un type de médicament visant à contrôler les symptômes moteurs, l’agoniste dopaminergique, serait l’un des principaux facteurs liés à son développement. Par le biais d’une synthèse narrative présentée dans le chapitre 3, les mécanismes neurobiologiques et les autres facteurs en lien sont discutés. Un important constat ressort toutefois : l’étude des habitudes de jeu de ces patients est pratiquement absente. Ce constat est surprenant puisque la littérature sur le jeu regorge d’informations à prendre en considération dans le développement de ce trouble, telles que les types de jeu pratiqués, les montants dépensés, les raisons pour jouer et la présence de proches. Le deuxième article consiste donc à répondre à cette lacune relevée en faisant le portrait de leurs habitudes de jeu. Vingt-cinq personnes souffrant de la MP ont été recrutées et parmi celles-ci, quinze ont joué dans les six derniers mois. L’examen de leurs habitudes de jeu révèle que les jeux préférés sont la loterie et la machine à sous et qu’elles ont, en majorité, débuté la pratique de ces jeux avant l’établissement du diagnostic de la MP. Les patients sont moins intéressés à jouer aux machines à sous comparativement à un échantillon de joueurs âgés de plus de 55 ans mais, en contrepartie, ce jeu est celui auquel les plus grands montants étaient dépensés chez les participants qui ont rapporté avoir développé un problème de jeu. Les participants jouent pour le plaisir ou pour gagner de l’argent, mais des raisons non répertoriées, liées à leur maladie, ont été relevées. Ces patients n’ont pas recours à des proches aidants pour les aider dans la pratique de leur jeu favori et ces derniers ont manifesté leur méconnaissance de la pratique de jeux de hasard et d’argent des participants. Parmi l’ensemble des participants rencontrés, trois d’entre eux se sont révélés être des joueurs à risque. En plus de jouer aux machines à sous, des croyances erronées et des motivations spécifiques à jouer ont été relevées chez ces derniers. La réflexion découlant de ces résultats pourra stimuler la recherche dans l’étude des variables psychosociales en lien avec le développement d’un problème de jeu chez ces patients.

Determinantes da utilização de sites de apostas online em Portugal

Com a proliferação da internet assistiu-se desde a década de 90 a um aumento exponencial das casas de jogo online, estando muitas delas traduzidas para português e aceitando euros. Sendo este um tema pouco estudado em Portugal, pretende-se desenvolver e validar um modelo conceptual que reflita os fatores que levam o consumidor a utilizar este tipo de sites. Numa altura em que o governo p g ês p de “ eg iz ” es ivid de, é igualmente interessante perceber qual o perfil do público-alvo, as suas motivações e preferências face à oferta existente. A análise fatorial exploratória, a análise de fiabilidade e os modelos de regressão linear foram as técnicas utilizadas para validar este modelo. Com base num questionário, este estudo mostrou que a expectativa de desempenho, influência social, condições facilitadoras, motivações hedónicas, valor do preço, hábito e o risco psicológico, financeiro e de tempo são fatores determinantes da intenção de utilização de sites de jogo online. Do estudo emergem relevantes implicações académicas e para o mundo empresarial.

“Adição ao Jogo online”

Esta dissertação visa compreender a adição ao jogo online, através de duas perspetivas complementares que se congregam num estudo de caso. Analisamos o discurso de um jogador predominantemente de Blackjack online adicto a esta prática (F.) em processo de desabituação, e desenvolvemos a mesma metodologia junto da mãe deste, enquanto fonte complementar de informação, através de entrevistas semi-estruturadas. Desta análise emergiram resultados que clarificam os fatores que funcionam como determinantes da adição, que a mantêm bem como elementos indispensáveis para compreender a decisão de paragem do jogo. Nesta dinâmica conjugamos a perspetiva de F e da sua mãe. A metodologia escolhida para análise dos dados de investigação foi a Grounded Analysis Theory, partindo das vozes dos dois participantes e tendo como objetivo a construção de uma narrativa alternativa e assim contribuir para uma melhor análise de compreensão dos dados obtidos. Através de um processo indutivo de produção de conhecimento organizado e obedecendo a uma sequência que busca uma maior complexidade de integração, tem como objetivo final gerar uma teoria sustentada nos dados recolhidos (Fernandes & Maia, 2001). Enquanto metodologia qualitativa permite-nos aceder aos significados múltiplos que emergiram da experiência destes dois participantes. O jogo online sustentado na sua fácil disponibilidade tem como consequência um maior isolamento do jogador, e uma vez que as recompensas financeiras são uma possibilidade alimenta o ciclo do comportamento aditivo. A observância de problemas físicos e psicológicos percebidos como graves, justificaram uma abordagem de tratamento multidisciplinar, envolvendo ajuda farmacológica, psicológica e social. Os estudos existentes sobre o jogo online são ainda muito escassos, justificandose o estudo qualitativo na construção do conhecimento, pela análise mais detalhada dos fatores que podem contribuir para uma melhor compreensão de todas as especificidades presentes, numa perturbação aditiva ao jogo online.

Suomalaisten julkisesti listattujen senttiosakkeiden suoriutuminen verrattuna OMX Helsinki Small Cap -indeksin muihin osakkeisiin

Senttiosakkeista tehtyjä tutkimuksia on olemassa hyvin rajoitetusti, ja ne ovat keskittyneet lähinnä senttiosakelistautumisiin. Tässä tutkielmassa tarkastellaan suomalaisia julkisesti noteerattuja senttiosakkeita ja niiden suoriutumista kymmenen vuoden ajanjaksolla vuosina 2006–2015. Tavoitteena oli selvittää, onko suomalaisiin julkisesti noteerattuihin senttiosakkeisiin sijoittaminen kannattavaa toimintaa ja minkälaisia tuottoja on odotettavissa senttiosakkeisiin sijoittamalla. Tutkimusaineisto koostui tutkielmassa tehdyn määritelmän mukaisista senttiosakkeista ja muista Small Cap -indeksin osakkeista, joita kutsuttiin puolestaan ei-senttiosakkeiksi. Tuotot laskettiin osakkeiden päivittäisistä tuottoindekseistä. Tuottoja verrattiin lyhyellä, keskipitkällä ja pitkällä aikavälillä. Tuottojen tarkastelun tueksi senttiosakkeille ja ei-senttiosakkeille laskettiin seuraavat menestysmittarit: Sharpen luku, Treynorin indeksi ja Jensenin alfa. Lopuksi verrattiin vielä seuraavia tunnuslukuja: ROE (%), E/P-luku, P/B-luku, osinkotuotto-% ja velan suhde omaan pääomaan (%). Saatujen tulosten perusteella suomalaiset julkisesti noteeratut senttiosakkeet ovat lyhyellä aikavälillä kannattavia sijoituskohteita, mutta mitä pidemmäksi tarkasteluperiodi kasvoi, sitä huonommin ne suoriutuivat. Lisäksi senttiosakkeet hävisivät kaikilla tarkasteluperiodeilla ei-senttiosakkeille. Suurimmat positiiviset tuotot olivat kuitenkin yksittäisillä senttiosakkeilla. Senttiosakkeisiin havaittiin liittyvän paljon riskejä, kuten suuri volatiliteetti, suuret negatiiviset tuotot ja konkurssin mahdollisuus. Myös kaikki menestysmittarit ja tunnusluvut indikoivat senttiosakkeiden olevan ei-senttiosakkeita huonompia sijoituskohteita. Sijoittajien on oltava erityisen tarkkoja senttiosakkeiden kanssa, sillä niihin sijoittaminen on pitkälti verrattavissa uhkapelaamiseen.

Neural representations of social and non-social uncertainty in human decision making

The social landscape is filled with an intricate web of species-specific desired objects and course of actions. Humans are highly social animals and, as they navigate this landscape, they need to produce adapted decision-making behaviour. Traditionally social and non-social neural mechanisms affecting choice have been investigated using different approaches. Recently, in an effort to unite these findings, two main theories have been proposed to explain how the brain might encode social and non-social motivational decision-making: the extended common currency and the social valuation specific schema (Ruff & Fehr 2014). One way to test these theories is to directly compare neural activity related to social and non-social decision outcomes within the same experimental setting. Here we address this issue by focusing on the neural substrates of social and non-social forms of uncertainty. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) we directly compared the neural representations of reward and risk prediction and errors (RePE and RiPE) in social and non- social situations using gambling games. We used a trust betting game to vary uncertainty along a social dimension (trustworthiness), and a card game (Preuschoff et al. 2006) to vary uncertainty along a non-social dimension (pure risk). The trust game was designed to maintain the same structure of the card game. In a first study, we exposed a divide between subcortical and cortical regions when comparing the way these regions process social and non-social forms of uncertainty during outcome anticipation. Activity in subcortical regions reflected social and non-social RePE, while activity in cortical regions correlated with social RePE and non-social RiPE. The second study focused on outcome delivery and integrated the concept of RiPE in non-social settings with that of fairness and monetary utility maximisation in social settings. In particular these results corroborate recent models of anterior insula function (Singer et al. 2009; Seth 2013), and expose a possible neural mechanism that weights fairness and uncertainty but not monetary utility. The third study focused on functionally defined regions of the early visual cortex (V1) showing how activity in these areas, traditionally considered only visual, might reflect motivational prediction errors in addition to known perceptual prediction mechanisms (den Ouden et al 2012). On the whole, while our results do not support unilaterally one or the other theory modeling the underlying neural dynamics of social and non-social forms of decision making, they provide a working framework where both general mechanisms might coexist.

La fiebre del juego ataca a Tío Sam

Fondo Margaritainés Restrepo

Commentary on: Are we overpathologizing everyday life? A tenable blueprint for behavioral addiction research: On functional and compulsive aspects of reinforcement pathologies

Background: This paper is a commentary to a debate article entitled: "Are we overpathologizing everyday life? A tenable blueprint for behavioral addiction research", by Billieux et al. (2015). Methods and aim: This brief response focused on the necessity to better characterize psychological and related neurocognitive determinants of persistent deleterious actions associated or not with substance utilization. Results: A majority of addicted people could be driven by psychological functional reasons to keep using drugs, gambling or buying despite the growing number of related negative consequences. In addition, a non-negligible proportion of them would need assistance to restore profound disturbances in basic learning processes involved in compulsive actions. Conclusions: The distinction between psychological functionality and compulsive aspects of addictive behaviors should represent a big step towards more efficient treatments.

Défices cognitivos em pacientes com depressão unipolar: Influência das variáveis idade, género e história anterior de tentativas de suicídio

Tese de Doutoramento, Psicologia, Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais, Universidade do Algarve, 2015