In most of life’s activities this doesn’t matter - you continue with the activity if you like it and you drop it if you don’t. But if you become addicted then a craving, triggered by the release of dopamine in your brain, makes you keep looking for that reward even though when it arrives it may disappoint.
Gambling has an extra lure. It’s been noted in behavioural psychology that getting the same reward every time you do something loses its charm. But getting enough of a reward just enough of the time keeps you interested. That applies whether you’re a laboratory rat pressing a lever for pellets of food, a gambler in stocks and shares, or making bets on your phone on who will win the next corner in a football match. You’ll win often enough to keep you hooked.
We need very good education and treatment services. The availability of gambling by smartphone means that, by now, the genie is out of the bottle and a long, long way down the road. So treatment services shouldn’t be an afterthought or something to which lip service is paid.