Self Control Deficits and Pathological Gambling

The present paper focuses on the concepts of self-control and impulsivity as central features of clinical disorders like pathological gambling. The main purpose is to show the link between models in biopsychology and experiments with animals concerning self-control and models in clinical psychology involving patients with impulse control deficits. A representative model of each of the two research fields is discussed along with empirical studies and their implications for theory and treatment of pathological gambling. Self-control is defined as the ability to control one's impulses. The lack of self-control is called impulsivity. Individuals with disorders like pathological gambling, sex addiction and substance abuse have all in common that they have self-control deficits and are thus impulsive. One of the most used measures of self-control deficits in clinical studies is the discounting rate of delayed rewards. Since self-control deficits are signs of impulsivity and impatience to satisfy one's desires without delay, this measure provides a useful tool for assessment and therapy of pathological gamblers and substance abusers. Given the choice between an immediate reward and a larger reward at a future point of time, an impulsive individual would choose the smaller but immediate reward over the larger delayed reward, because of the impatience and the self-control deficit. This result implies a higher discounting rate for the impulsive individual. But self-control and impulsivity are not restricted to the area of clinical psychology. These concepts were first developed in biopsychological studies and applied in animal experiments. Similar to the human participants in the clinical studies later, the animals were confronted with a choice between two alternatives: an immediate and a delayed. The measurement of self-control versus impulsivity resembled very much that of delayed discounting later. The evidence from these experiments suggests that, in general, animals have a very high rate of discounting and are thus highly impulsive. In summary, the concepts of self-control and impulsivity can be interpreted as a key link between biopsychological experiments with animals and clinical studies with pathological gamblers and substance abusers. The former pioneered the research in the field and the latter applied the concepts to humans were able to analyze their findings based on the principles established by animal studies. The main purpose of the current study is to present the conceptual interrelation between animal learning and pathological gambling as shown in the application and meaning of self-control and impulsivity. The present study is structured as following. At first, the biopsychological models of self-control and its measurement are discussed using one representative model (Rachlin & Green, 1972). Then the clinical models of self-control deficits are presented with special emphasis on pathological gambling. In addition, the model of delayed discounting widely used in clinical studies is summarized. Finally, the implications of the concepts of self-control and impulsivity for the clinical research and practice are explored. 2. The Biopsychological Model of Self-Control One of the most productive researchers in this area or psychology has been Rachlin. Despite a considerable amount of current research on the topic, the famous study of Rachlin and Green (1972) still serves as the basis for all future studies. Therefore, in the following this model is going to be discussed in more detail as representative for the biopsychological approach to self-control and impulsivity.