MEASURING GAMBLING CRAVING AMONG ADOLESCENTS: THE PSYCHOMETRIC PROPERTIES OF THE GAMBLING CRAVING SCALE

Although craving is an important feature of adolescent problem gambling, there is little attention on tools capable of providing a valid and reliable measure of gambling desire with this age target. A brief scale to assess the different aspects of the gambling-related craving is the Gambling Craving Scale (GACS; Young & Wohl, 2009), a multidimensional instrument comprising nine items assessing three different dimensions: Anticipation, Desireand and Relief. This study aims at investigating the psychometric properties of the GACS in Italian adolescents. Participants were 2496 adolescents (59% males, Mage= 16.40, SD = 1.22) attending high school. Through confirmatory factor analyses, a three-factor structure was supported (CFI =.95). The internal consistency was good for all the factors and for the total scale. As regards the validity, the three GACS resulted to discriminate across non-problem and at-risk/problem gamblers, and correlated with a positive perception of gambling.