Xinhua On Cai learned that recently, the signing ceremony of Henan Sports Lottery "Soul Station" was held in Henan Sports Lottery Center. The opening of the "Soul Station" will provide professional psychological consulting services for lottery players and sports lottery practitioners in the province.
According to the enterprise investigation data, Zhengzhou Yulu Psychological Consulting Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Yulu Psychological Consulting) was registered in September 2016, with a registered capital of 300,000 yuan and the legal representative Bai Yinliang.
According to the official website of Yulu Psychological Counseling, Bai Yinliang graduated from Henan University with a bachelor's degree in applied psychology, is a registered psychologist (X-21-059) of the clinical registration system of the Chinese Psychological Association, and served as the deputy director of the Zhengzhou 12355 Adolescent Psychological Counseling Center from 2012 to 2014.
The news does not disclose who pays the consultation fee, but according to past experience, the consultation fee is often paid by the lottery center to the partner, and there is no fee for lottery players and lottery practitioners to consult.
Problem bettors are receiving more and more attention
The establishment of psychological counseling studios by lottery institutions is nothing new, and Zhengzhou Sports Lottery is not the first lottery institution in China to open psychological counseling services.
As early as February 2012, Suzhou Fucai established the first "Lottery People's Heart Voice Station" in Jiangsu Province to provide free psychological counseling for bettors who bet irrationally by hiring mental health experts.
On June 2 last year, the Sports Lottery Center of Jinhua City, Zhejiang Province, set up a psychological counseling studio, which is the first sports lottery psychological counseling studio in the province.
Also last year, on September 16, Chongqing Fucai WeChat mobile terminal opened an online psychological counseling service channel, providing professional and convenient psychological consulting services for lottery players, lottery station owners and salesmen free of charge.
According to incomplete statistics from the National Lottery magazine, dozens of lottery institutions in China have set up service hotlines for lottery buyers and distributors to provide psychological consulting services for lottery players and lottery practitioners.
This is what has happened in recent years, and the background is that the state has proposed the concept of "responsibility lottery".
In the responsible lottery system, lottery players are one of the important contents, including providing responsible games for lottery players, advocating rational betting, and helping problem gamblers.
Not only domestically, but also internationally, the prevention of problem bettors is also listed as one of the important contents of the responsible lottery, such as the World Lottery Association's responsible lottery level 4 certification, which includes "player education".
Lottery centers in various places have successively set up psychological consulting services, which on the one hand is not only a requirement of the responsible lottery, but also shows that the phenomenon of problem lottery players is receiving more and more attention.
What can counseling do?
Psychological counseling, despite its name, is not limited to counseling, and there are many things that can be done. In the cooperation between Yulu Psychological Counseling and Henan Sports Lottery, in addition to psychological counseling, it also includes the provision of psychological assessment, psychological education and other services.
On top of that, much more can be done.
The Hong Kong Jockey Club has always advocated restrained gambling, has done a fairly good job of serving problem gamblers and is the first organisation in Asia to be awarded the World Lottery Association's Level 4 (highest) certification for controlled gambling.
As early as 2001, the Club commissioned experts to conduct independent research to find out the most effective ways to prevent problem gambling.
In 2003, the Club set up the Pacific Fund to provide counselling, treatment and support services to troubled gamblers by funding the Peace Fund, with a view to minimising the adverse impact of gambling on society, with a total subsidy of over HK$360 million by 2018/19.
The scope of funding includes: research on gambling-related and derivative issues, public education and other measures to prevent and alleviate problem gambling, counselling and treatment services for problem gamblers, morbid gamblers and other affected persons, and other support measures.
In providing counselling and treatment services, the Club has set up four problem gambling counselling and treatment centres, which are well known – in 2016, the Hong Kong Home Affairs Bureau commissioned the Hong Kong Polytechnic University to conduct a study on the gambling behaviour of Hong Kong people, and one of the findings mentioned that 81.9% of the respondents were aware of the gambling hotline, of which 69.4% said that they would seek assistance from the gambling counselling service centre if they or their families had gambling problems.
That is to say, in addition to psychological counseling and public education, there are also investigations and studies that can be done, the production of relevant publicity videos, etc., and in public education, it is not as simple as convening relevant people to give a lecture.
Take the Jockey Club as an example.
During the 2014 FIFA World Cup, the Peace Fund, together with the Home Affairs Bureau and the Hong Kong Police Force, organised the largest promotional activities in Hong Kong, including the display of giant statues of cartoon characters in the football series in the downtown area, bringing out the message of enjoying football and sports events with a positive attitude to young people in a joyful and relaxed way; holding carnivals in various districts, setting up stalls and games, inviting different performance groups to participate in education and entertainment, and promoting them to the public through television, radio, magazines and social networking sites.
During the World Cup, more than 70 social service agencies and schools participated, more than 100 various activities were held, and 290,000 people directly participated in the activities, reaching more than 1 million citizens in total.
It can be seen that if we can unite other forces such as social institutions and schools to give full play to the public education effect of psychological counseling to a greater extent, it is undoubtedly worth learning from us.