Values in Gambling Research and Implications for Public Policy

Abstract

We are often told that we should have no value position in our research. Of particular interest here, we are told that values should not play a part in gambling research that highlights adverse social impacts. In this paper I will unpick these propositions in discussing the place of values and morals in gambling research and implications for public policy. I will begin with a brief overview of the philosophical basis of modern science and, for the remainder of the discussion, I will examine some of its ramifications as played out in current gambling research and policy—to the strategic advantage of certain sectional interests. For reasons given in the paper, poker machine gambling, in particular, forms the focus of the discussion.