Clinical consensus statements on intervention content for gambling treatment: a contextualised Delphi study with clinical researchers

Keshani, IM, Merkouris, SS, Rodda, SN, Abbott, M, Aubin, H-J, Bellringer, ME, Berman, AH, Billieux, J, Bowden-Jones, H, Browning, CJ, Carlbring, P, Castrén, S, Chamberlain, SR, Christensen, DR, Demetrovics, Z, Derevensky, J, Fernandez-Aranda, F, Gainsbury, S, Ginley, MK, Griffiths, MD ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8880-6524, Håkansson, A, Hodgins, DC, Jackson, A, Jimenez-Murcia, S, King, DL, Landon, J, Luquiens, A, Molander, O, Nilsson, A, Odlaug, BL, Potenza, MN, Thomas, SA, Whelan, J and Dowling, NA, 2026. Clinical consensus statements on intervention content for gambling treatment: a contextualised Delphi study with clinical researchers. International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction. ISSN 1557-1874

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Abstract

There is little consensus on the optimal components of gambling psychological treatments. This study aimed to identify clinical consensus statements regarding the perceived effectiveness of gambling intervention content (change techniques, participant/recruitment characteristics, delivery characteristics, and evaluation characteristics) from a panel of researchers with psychological gambling treatment expertise across 11 countries. A two-round modified Delphi study was conducted. Thirty-five panellists rated the perceived effectiveness of 96 gambling intervention components for achieving clinically helpful change, which was defined as “reduction in gambling severity, expenditure, and frequency”. Consensus criteria on effectiveness and ineffectiveness were defined a priori. Consensus statements were identified for four of 19 change techniques (motivational enhancement, relapse prevention, cognitive restructuring, and plan social support), five of 23 participant/recruitment characteristics (e.g. eligibility screening took place), 17 of 47 delivery characteristics (e.g. the therapy goal was to reduce time and/or money spent gambling), and three of seven evaluation characteristics (e.g. specific process or mediators are targeted by the intervention). These statements, when interpreted with consideration of contextual factors, can inform the selection of likely effective components to employ in gambling treatment programs and indicate where future research efforts may be most beneficial.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction
Creators:	Keshani, I.M., Merkouris, S.S., Rodda, S.N., Abbott, M., Aubin, H.-J., Bellringer, M.E., Berman, A.H., Billieux, J., Bowden-Jones, H., Browning, C.J., Carlbring, P., Castrén, S., Chamberlain, S.R., Christensen, D.R., Demetrovics, Z., Derevensky, J., Fernandez-Aranda, F., Gainsbury, S., Ginley, M.K., Griffiths, M.D., Håkansson, A., Hodgins, D.C., Jackson, A., Jimenez-Murcia, S., King, D.L., Landon, J., Luquiens, A., Molander, O., Nilsson, A., Odlaug, B.L., Potenza, M.N., Thomas, S.A., Whelan, J. and Dowling, N.A.
Publisher:	Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date:	30 January 2026
ISSN:	1557-1874
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1007/s11469-025-01565-4 DOI 2567803 Other
Rights:	© The Author(s) 2026. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Laura Borcherds
Date Added:	04 Feb 2026 14:20
Last Modified:	04 Feb 2026 14:20
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/55182

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