A comparative latent class analysis of endorsement profiles of DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for problem gambling among adolescents from a community and a treatment sample

The DSM-IV approach to gambling taxonomy is predicated upon the number of diagnostic criteria with little regard for the nature of the specific items. This study examined the variation in gambling pathology that might exist due to the specific pattern of DSM-IV criteria endorsement, these differences between genders, and in the presence of prior addictions. The likelihood of item endorsement for the DSM-IV criteria for males and females in a community and a treatment sample of adolescents with known prior history of substance abuse was examined. A significant gender effect was found for several DSM-IV items in the community sample but not in the treatment sample. Latent class analyses identified different subtypes or classes of endorsement patterns of DSM-IV gambling criteria in adolescents which differed according to whether we looked at males or females in a community sample of adolescents or at a group of treatment adolescents. The results suggest that there may be a divergence in the pathways that male and female adolescent gamblers negotiate depending on the nature of their gambling behaviours. There seems to be a pathway with physiological components and a separate pathway involving antisocial behaviours. Furthermore, male and female adolescent gamblers with prior addictions have a pattern of gambling behaviours in which the vulnerability to gambling problems is more likely to involve behaviours with physiological or neuroadaptive components than antisocial behaviours and this vulnerability is particularly acute for female substance-dependent gamblers where the development of tolerance plays an especially important role.</.