NCRG Perspectives: Phil Satre
The following is an excerpt from a keynote address delivered May 27 at the 12th International Conference on Gambling and Risk Taking in Vancouver, British Columbia.
From my perspective, the profile of the research community is rising, as state, provincial and federal governments around the world evaluate existing gambling policy and the costs and benefits of proposed changes.
That is a welcome and much-needed development. All too often, policy-making has been based more on myth and misperception than on empirical evidence. I firmly believe the research community should be where policy-makers go for unbiased expertise.
I believe the National Center for Responsible Gaming (NCRG), on whose board of directors I am proud to serve, has developed a model not only to advance science, but also to protect the reputations of scholars working on gambling issues and the gaming industry itself.
When the NCRG was established in 1996, many observers were rightly skeptical of the motivations and credibility of a problem-gambling research organization funded by the U.S. commercial casino industry. The skeptics claimed the NCRG was a self-serving venture that could never produce any legitimate progress toward addressing problem gambling.
Seven years later, though, I believe even our harshest critics have changed their opinions.
Today, the NCRG is the largest source of funding for independent, peer-reviewed problem gambling research in the United States. In addition to funding independent scientific research, the NCRG promotes public awareness of problem and youth gambling through conferences and other programs for researchers, treatment providers, gaming-industry employees and public policy-makers.
And using sound science to lead its progress, the NCRG has developed a reputation as a trusted leader in funding significant research on the prevention and treatment of gambling problems. Clearly, the achievements of the NCRG have proved the skeptics wrong.
But the NCRG is not a panacea, and we have no intention of resting on our laurels. Today, the NCRG is looking to new challenges and new ways of providing leadership in the field of responsible gaming.
With that in mind, last December we added a new objective - funding new research on gambling and its consequences that will result in practical education, prevention and treatment applications.
Maintaining a socially responsible industry requires moving evidence-based practices beyond health care and into the gambling-policy arena.
The regulators of the gaming industry must have a body of experimental science on which to base their decisions. That means the development and utilization of new sources of valid, reliable and relevant data. The NCRG is committed to this new goal.
