Investigating a Social Marketing Issue: Gambling - Coursework Example

GAMBLING AS A SOCIAL MARKETING ISSUE al Affiliation GAMBLING AS A SOCIAL MARKETING ISSUE Social marketing refers to the strategies and that the operations that organizations engaged to purse both economic and social impacts. While marketing is an important aspect of business developing, there are many times when market has negative social implications for the society. Gambling is one of the problems that have become a global social concern issue that manifests the negative impacts of marketing. Advertising of gambling, drugs and other products that have negative social implications may affect the wellbeing of the society. According to behaviour change theories, creating awareness of the harmful products within the market contributes to increase in the severity of social issues, which in turn leads to social controversy. The government and other bodies are now concerned with companies’ advertisement programs to ensure that any marketing operations do not contribute to social rottenness and that they promote the wellbeing in the society. Some countries have banned advertisement of gambling to prevent the danger that such programs are creating within the public. Since gambling has resulted to decline in person productivity and has led to increase in crime level, there is an urgent need to curb advertisements that promote gambling in the society. Pathological and Problem gambling are serious problems affecting the vast population in the world. Research by Reith in collaboration with the Scottish center for social research (2006) shows that gambling is a behavior that is out of control and one that disrupts personal, family, and financial and employment relations in the contemporary society. In Britain, approximately 300, 000 people, 1% of the citizen population, are problem gamblers. Additionally, any person within a radius of 10 km from a Casino is at the risk of developing a gambling habit (Wong et al, 2000). Since the problem is growing rapidly, it has attracted a lot of attention among many researchers, seeking to identify the causes and effects of gambling habits in various regions of the world. The government in the UK has asserted that the issue of gambling is a matter of urgency that must be solved collaboratively if the society is to survive the problems that emanates from this behavior. The reason why this problem has escalated today in the society is because the predisposing conditions are not yet identified and the effects of the behavior have been undermined by the society at large. Through research, it is possible to identify the causes and the effects of the gambling behavior which can help the government and other bodies in their struggle to curb the spread of this behavior in the society today. In the contemporary society, gambling is a behavior that has become uncontrollable and its effects are becoming severe in the community. Besides, more research has focused on the issue of gambling a social marketing issue that companies need to take more keen consideration. Messerlian and Derevensky (2007) are among scholars who have focused on the issue of gambling as a social marketing issue that has affected the youths within the global arena. In their research, they identify that social advertising as one of the reasons why the problem of gambling has increased in the society. The increase in gaming demand has become an important perspective for the media. Urbanization has made the gambling rooms more accessible as the youth constantly interact with advertisements on the streets. Casinos are using street televisions to advertise their activities within large towns which results to increase in awareness among youths. Besides, the advertisements on smoking and drinking have become contributing factors to advertisements. Evidently, youths who smoke and drink are more aware of gambling dens and hence are more likely to engage in gambling activities. Therefore, there is evidence that marketing has ignored the possible harm that such ads may have to the young generation within the society. They note that there has been an increase in the media advertising portraying gambling as appropriate business. With the current deregulation of both traditional and internet gambling methods, the organizations have constantly increased their marketing campaigns that seek to portray gambling as exciting and enjoyable to the youths. As a matter of fact, youths are part of the target population for such companies. For instance, in the UK, increase in internet advertisement of gambling has resulted to a surge in the number of youths participating in such games. The situation has become worse with the current saturation of media with statistics showing the youths spend more than 21hours watching TV programs every week. This implies that children are at high risk of exposure to problem gambling while watching their programs. In a different research, Messerlian and Derevensky (2006) focused on the way that media portrays gambling as appropriate gaming and the way this impacts youth behaviors. Often, the media paints gambling as ordinary gaming without considering it as a social issue that has become complex to curb. This research shows that there is a great relationship between social media advertisement and the increase in this habit among the youths. King, Delfabbro & Griffiths (2010) is a different group of scholars who have considered a more recent problem that has led to increase in the social problem. This group of researchers notes that there exists a convergence between the proliferation of internet and the problem of gambling within the society. The youths, who form the largest population of the internet community, are exposed at their early ages to gambling as ordinary gaming. They can access social sites where they can gamble virtually on the internet and watch videos of gambling. Gambling organizations use such avenues to meet their target groups since they are aware of the effectiveness of internet marketing. While the virtual games may be unreal and may be meant to be mere games for the youths, they expose the youths to gambling and this may increase their chances of engaging in real gambling. Research shows that about 20% of youths who engage in gambling learnt this behavior online and that they engage to feel the real aspect of the games that they play online. From this perspective, it is apparent that internet portrayal of gambling has contributed to the upsurge of the crisis of addictive gambling. King, Delfabbro & Griffiths (2010) are keen to note the psychological of information and behavior construction in the society. The argument of the authors is that the information that the youth acquire as they grow has a great influence to their future behaviors. The implication of this idea is that as the youth gamble in the virtual world, they build the desire to practice such behavior when they grow up. This argument is line with the learning theory of behavior change. This theory holds that complex behaviors are developed through exposure to simple behaviors during the period of growth (Skinner, 2010). Therefore, youth’s exposure to simple gambling games over the internet leads them to learn complex and problematic gambling. Since people choose behavior depending on the perceived benefits that comes from such actions, it is clear that gambling is attractive to the youths. The youths are excited when they win money online through simple gambling games. The idea they develop is that gambling is rewarding and that they can engaged in this behavior to make money. Therefore, the learning behavior change theory advocates provision of positive information that will influence members of the public to acquire responsible behavior. A wide range of research has been conducted regarding the various perspectives of the problem in the society. Reith with ScotGen (2006) recognized that gambling has both social and economic impacts in the society today. However, his research focused mainly on the social impact of problem gambling in the society. This research identified that males under the age of 35 years, the economically disadvantage, and youths in colleges are at higher risk of engaging in gambling. Recent research showed that drug abuses, alcoholism, poverty and peer influence and increase in the number of Casinos in the urban areas are the causes of the gambling behavior. Most researchers have come into a concession that there is a direct linkage between gambling and community problems (Sproston et al, 2000). Grant et al (2002) showed that gambling results to economic crisis in families, drug addiction, conflict within family members and poverty in the community. In the academic environment, youths with gambling habits drop from their education and suffer from alcohol and drug addiction. The California Research Bureau (2012) set out to investigate the reason why many people are stuck into the habit of gambling. The finding of this research showed that the gambling is psychosocial problem that is affected by the psychological desires of the mind. By creating a link between the medical needs and the gambling behavior, the California center of research suggests that a psychological approach is important if the problem of gambling is to be overcome in the society today. Statistics indicate that the number of pathological gamblers is almost equal to the number of problem gamblers. The gambling market now stands at a value of US$35, a value that is much higher than the Casino game market. The use of media of as a behavior minimization strategy seems to have failed to solve the problem. Evidently, the media has focused on discouraging a wide range of behaviors within the society. For instance, the creation of awareness of gambling as a social problem that destroys the society has become more common. However, the effectiveness of such advertisements has become more ineffective (Smeaton and Griffiths, 2004). While the government has used the media such as Television, radio and magazines to create awareness, it is apparent that such behavior is hard to control and there are other sources of information that provide youths with the incentive to gamble. The government has particularly failed to target online advertisement that has more serious impacts. The internet has become the easiest way to distribute and access information and advertising companies are moving towards this direction. Those in the gambling business use modern technology and have reduced their use of television and radio advertisements. Therefore, the government moves have remained inefficient and their social campaigns are yet to realize the objectives of reducing gambling within the world. From this perspective, it is crucial that the government focuses on more strict policies to campaign against gambling within the society. First, the government needs to stop any media advertisement that portrays gambling as ordinary gaming. Such actions by the government have proven effective in the past. For instance, the UK government has seen positive results after banning any smoking advertisements within the country (Smeaton and Griffiths, 2004). Secondly, the government must conduct internet censorship to ensure that they control aggressive marketing behavior that propagates information on gambling. Viewing of any YouTube videos that have gambling portrayal should be stopped and any game sites that show encourage such behavior should be closed. Reducing the information on gambling that the public can access will help to streamline responsible behavior among youths and reduce problem gambling. Also, the government must encourage organizations that offer gambling to shun from creating such knowledge to ensure that they remain socially responsible. As the behavior change theory suggests, shortage of information concerning gambling will prevent the youths from developing such risky behaviors. In conclusion, gambling as a social marketing issue, demands for immediate censorship of information to solve the problem. The main effort of the government and the organizations should be to reduce the information available within the public domain regarding gambling that may promote such behavior. With less regulation and media proliferation, especially in the internet-age, there is evidence that vulnerable groups have access to information that motivates them to engage in the vice. Since the youths construct their behavior from the information at their disposal, reducing information on gambling can be a milestone in creating a responsible society. Therefore, organizations must join in hands with the government in ensuring that information that may promote such behavior is out of the public domain. Bibliography King, D., Delfabbro, P., & Griffiths, M. 2010, the convergence of gambling and digital media: Implications for gambling in young people. Journal of Gambling Studies, 26(2), 175-187. California Research Bureau, 2012, Why Do People Gamble Too Much. California State Library. Castellani, B. 2000, Pathological gambling: The making of a medical problem. Albany: State University of New York Press Grant, J., et al, 2002. Pathological Gambling and Alcohol Use Disorder. Alcohol Research and Health, 26 (2), Pp, 143 -150. Messerlian, C., & Derevensky, J. 2006, Social marketing campaigns for youth gambling prevention: Lessons learned from youth. International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction, 4(4), 294-306. Messerlian, C., & Derevensky, J. 2007, evaluating the role of social marketing campaigns to prevent youth gambling problems: A qualitative study. Canadian Journal of Public Health/Revue Canadienne de Santee Publique, 101-104. Reith, G., and ScotCen, 2005, Research on the Social impact of Gambling. The Scottish Centre of Social Research. Skinner, B. F. 2010, About behaviorism. New York: Vintage Books. Smeaton, M., & Griffiths, M. 2004, Internet gambling and social responsibility: An exploratory study. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 7(1), 49-57. Sproston, K., et al, 2000, Gambling Behavior in Britain. National Centre for Social Research. Wong, P., McAustan, P. and Bray, B. 2000, Survey of Problem Gambling in the Metropolitan Detroit Area. United Way Community Services Read More