Could social casino apps be the key to weaning Australia’s pokies addicts off their drug of choice?

Australia boasts the world’s most avid gamblers, with the average Aussie adult losing over $1k per year to various gambling activity. The chief beneficiary of this national gambling jones is the video poker (pokies) industry, the excesses of which recently led the state of Victoria to introduce the country’s first pokies pre-commitment technology.

But perhaps there are other methods for decreasing pokies dependency. Researchers at Central Queensland University’s Experimental Gambling Research Laboratory are conducting a study to determine if free-to-play social casino apps could play a role in lessening the allure of real-money pokies play among problem gamblers.

Professor Matthew Rockloff told the Brisbane Times that interviews with problem gamblers suggested that the free-play casino apps offered “the same sort of rewarding characteristics” players were used to getting from pokies. Rockloff noted that the “intermittent wins” obtained via social casino apps offered a measure of satisfaction that came without the risk of players losing money.