Trends in Casino and Tourism for 21st Century - Example

In the last decade, the world has experienced a new phenomenon with a continuous growth in government owned legalized gambling. The change in the public policy has been undermined with the objective of the government to earn higher taxes and support leisure activities and entertainment to support the growth of the economy. The new era clearly highlights gambling as a medium of leisure and is an emerging area whose interest has continuously grown. Despite the fact that gamling has a significant social and health cost associated with it the increase in the number of people towards the activity as made people consider it as one of the leisure activities. The impact has been so strong that economies have started to consider it on their national agenda. Concerns have been raised by certain section of the society which includes stakeholders and social policy activitist against the growing popularity of gamling as a leisure activity but is largely limited. This essay thereby looks to present the manner in which gambling is being identified as a leisure activity despite the different issues and concerns being raised against it and the manner in which the importance of gambling is increasing every day. This helps to define gambling as a process of risking money or some other valuables which depends on the outcome of an event and the probability or chances of occurrence of an event is the same. The player while looking to gamble has to take additional risk for which the return of the person also increases in case the decision comes in the favor of the person. Gambling further takes different forms and can be played through lotteries, casinos, instant scratch tickets, slots and electronic VLTs, bingo, sports betting, as well as wagering in financial markets and over the Internet. The increase in the number of options has multiplied the opportunities that the different section of the society is able to avail towards gambling and has further increased the use of gambling in leisure activities (Goeldner and Ritchie, 2003). This has been matched by an increase in the number of casinos all over the world and the manner people look towards developing their tourism package so that they are able to visit the different casinos has developed interest in it. This has thereby transformed the behavior of the people towards gambling and has increased the level of interest thereby making more and more people to use it as a gambling activity. It has been identified that gambling is a part of human life as the different risk behaviour which people encounter everyday in their lives has given rise to different risk behaviors (Fay, 2005). The entire world fraternity is tender to gamble; as even watching sports on a television is a gamble which people look at associate with leisure activity due to the immense pleasure that people derive from watching it. The changes in population segment have brought widespread changes and have made gambling to be considered more as a leisure activity. This is been backed by a research which was carried out by Harrah’s Entertainment Inc. in 1996 where 91% of the respondents taking part in the survey assured that gambling was a form of leisure activity which was acceptable either for them or for others due to the intense pleasure and satisfaction that people derive from it (Lue, Crompton and Fesenmaier, 2003). Looking at the different factors which have contributed their interest in the field of gambling shows that the increasing popularity and the strong backing which has been received by the government by ensuring proper legislation has increased the popularity of gambling and has made more and more people look towards using it as an leisure activity. The different options and the opportunity to spend increased time have resulted in gambling being considered as a leisure activity. This has been backed by the fact that many countries have legalized gambling providing an additional opportunity for the society to indulge in and spend their leisure time. The manner in which gambling is being perceived as a leisure activity can be seen from Australia where the people were found to spent around $13,839 million in 2001. This is matched by the fact that gambling constitutes around 12% of the Australian government showing the high contribution which has increased the dependence on gambling and has resulted it being used by different section of the society for their leisure activities (McGowan, 2001). This has been matched by the fact that the disposable income of the people within the society has grown and has thereby increased the overall spending on different forms of gambling. This has been constibuted by improving tourism industry and the strong fundamentals through which better reforms have been developed and will aid towards the overall development of the society (Rephann, Dalton, Stair and Isserman, 1997). The other reason which makes it important to consider gambling as a leisure activity is seen from a research which brings forward that either local or residents from other part of the country are involved in gambling and has little tourist presence (Fay, 2005). This clearly indicates that more and more people are considering gambling as a leisure activity and are involved in it. The fact that the leisure activity also provides an opportunity where the person gambling has an opportunity to make money has made more and more local residents look at it both as a form of lesire activity and as a form to make some quick money. Individuals look it as an opportunity through which different individuals from different section of the society look at using gambling as a process through which they will be able to gain maximum effectiveness and bring the required transformation in carrying out the different activities associated with gambling (Roehl, 1996). This has been matched by the fact that gambling has undergone a lot of changes from the traditional times as in the modern age gambling has been given a complete new outlook. Gambling provides the player an opportunity to be satisfied as improvement in the service quality, different varieties of games, new experience, better promotional activities, have casinos and other gambling at convinient locations, high jackpot and special events has further caught the attention of the people. The fact that the gambling experience provides the customer with new and different experiecnes has further increased the use of gambling for different recreational purposes and has increased the increased the usage of gambling for different leisure activities. The continuous growth and development of the tourism sector has helped and ensured that more and more tourist also form part of the gambling industry. This has become possible because of the fact that the concept of leisure has looked to engulf tourism and the manner in which travel agents look at developing packages which includes air, hotels and gambling through casinos has increased. This has made more and more tourist look at using the services of casinos for their leisure activities and while looking to be on a tour. This has resulted in the change and development and has increased the focus of people towards gambling as it helps to enhance their experience and provides an opportunity through which people are able to enjoy their leisure time. This has been matched by the growth in quality casinos which helps to multiply the effectiveness as satisfaction and pleasure for the customers have increased and has thereby made more and more people look towards gambling especially while looking to carry out their lesire activities. The growth has been so strong that in Canada more than 82% of the household is engaged in gambling activities which includes different activities like government and non-government lotteries, raffles, casinos, slot machines and bingo. The fact that the modern society has started to consider gambling as leisure activity the importance has grown and has resulted in more and more people engaging in different activities associated with gambling. People especially the older people are seen to be associated with gambling as it helps them to get a sense of correctedness and socialization through their leisure time entertainment and creates a positive impact on their outlook towards things (Hing, 2001). This at times helps people to dela with mental stress as people associated with gambling derive immense pleasure through it and are able to use it as a recreational activity through which they are able to enjoy their leisure time. This has been further fuelled by the fact that the potential gamblers had the relevant knowledge and information that gambling has a higher degree of risk and people who totally were against gambling prefered other sources of entertainment to be part of their leisure activity. Gamblers on the other hand showed opposite results and preferred gambling and considered it as one of the best source of entertainment and an important leisure activity (Nicholas, Stitt and Giacopassi, 2002). The difference in the perception of people clearly brings forward the fact that different section of the society prefers gambling differently and is due ti the different positives and negatives that people are able to associate with it. Despite, the growing popularity of gambling as a leisure activity still considerable value is being given to understand gambling as a public health perspective. The adverse effect of gambling has resulted in creating an adverse effect on gamblers and on their families which has thereby affected their quality of life (Piscitelli and Albanese, 2000). The public health position has identified that there are both positives and negatives associated with gambling and they need to develop strategies which focuses on the positive side so that negatives and externalities can be controlled. This will help the society in treating gambling as a social activity which is indulged for the purpose of leisure and will provide the required dimensions through which better benefits will be accrued to the society. This has helped to identify the different consequences that gambling can directly result in and arises due to the fact that it has an impact directly or indirectly on the person and the family thereby creating the urgency to deal with those. Some of the negative impacts which is associated with gambling are gambling disorders, family dysfunction, domestic violence, youth gmbling problem, underage gambling, psychatric conditions, sicide, sucidial decisions, suicide attempts, financial problem, criminal behavior and similar other problems which makes it difficult for the person to carry out the daily duties normally (Johnson, 2002). One of the prime reasons which has given importance to gambling and increased the number of gambling activities that takes place is primarily due to the fact that government has legalized gambling in different countries and has provided the opportunity through which people can spend their leisure time. This has been matched by the growing importance being given to casinos and other form of gambling activities by tourists who are slowly starting to spend their leisure time in casinos (Eadington, 2000). This has helped to develop a culture where people have started to believe that gambling is a part of the society and have started to get involved in it. This has made more and more people spend their leisure time in this direction and have thereby created a positive impact on the overall decisions that are taken within the society. The essay thereby demonstrates the manner in which gambling is being looked as a leisure activity due to continuous growth being witnessed from all areas. Despite, the growth in the gambling industry with different opportunities being present before the different individuals it is seen that still some section of the society consider it as a taboo and are against it. Despite, different objections and restrictions being imposed by the different section of the society it is still witnessed as one area whose popularity has grown with changing times and more and more people are being seen to enter in different forms of gambling activities. The future further shows that the gambling industry will witness rapid growth and will be seen as one of the major leisure activities of the modern era as the future generations seems to be more engrossed towards gambling and will form a part of the daily activities. References Eadington, W. 2000. Trends in Casino and tourism for 21st century. Trends in outdoor recreation, leisure and tourism, p. 155-163 Fay, J. 2005. Service recovery: Doing it right the second time. Training, p. 42-48. Goeldner, C. and Ritchie, J. 2003. Tourism: Principles, Practices, Philosophies. John Willey and Sons, Inc. 9th Edition, p. 211-213 Hing, N. 2001. Changing the Odds: A Study of Corporate Social Principles and Practices in Addressing Problem Gambling. Journal of Business Ethics, 33, p.115-144 Johnson, L. 2002. Using the Critical Incident Technique to Assess Gaming Customer Satisfaction. UNLV Gaming Research and Review Journal, 6 (2), 1-12 Lue, C., Crompton, J. and Fesenmaier, D. 2003. Conceptualization of multi-destination pleasure trips. Annals of Tourism Research, 20 (2), 289-301 McGowan, R. 2001. Government and the Transformation of the Gaming Industy. Edward Elgar Publishing Inc., United States Nicholas, M., Stitt, B. and Giacopassi, D. 2002. Community Assessment of the Effects of Casinos on Quality of Life. Social Indicators Research, 57, 229-262 Piscitelli, F., and Albanese, J. 2000. Do Casinos Attract Criminals? Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 4 (16), 445-456 Rephann, J., Dalton, M., Stair A. and Isserman, A. 1997. Casino gambling as an economic development strategy. Tourism Economics, 3 (2), 161-183 Roehl, W. 1996. Competition, Casino, Spending, and Use of Casino Amenities. Journal of Travel Research, 34 (3), 57-62 Read More