The Japanese have a problem with gambling.
Gambling addiction is significantly higher in Japan than most other nations, according to a recent study.
In Japan, nearly five per cent of adults are addicted to the vice, which is five times more than most other nations.
On Wednesday, the study was released to local media in Japan.
It highlighted rising adult addiction to gambling as well as an increase in addiction to the Internet and alcohol.
Japan has long been famed for its tolerance to alcohol consumption and its love of technology.
“If something new becomes available, addiction will only rise,” Susumu Higuchi, Japan’s leading expert on addiction who headed the study, told local journalists according to the Asahi Shimbun newspaper.
The research was conducted by surveys that were taken last year. The project was sponsored by the Health Ministry. It comes at a time when the Japanese government are under increasing pressure following their controversial plans to legalise casino gambling in particular special zones. While others argue that the plans will result in greater tourism.
Researchers found that an estimated 5.36 million people in Japan (4.8 percent of the adult population) are likely pathological gamblers who cannot resist the impulse to wager, the Yomiuri Shimbun said.
The study claims that, 8.7 per cent of men and 1.8 per cent of women, fit the internationally-accepted definition of addicts.
The problem is not helped by the wide availability of pachinko parlours and other gambling establishments, according to campaigners.
A member of the group that conducted the research told reporters in Japan that most nations “stands more or less around one per cent of the adult population; so Japan’s ratio is high.”
7,000 Japanese adults nationwide were questioned as part of the survey. Of these, 4,153 gave valid answers.
The study also found that approximately 4.21 million adults show signs of Internet addiction, a rate that had risen 50 per cent in five years.
This rise in internet addiction was blamed on the spread of smartphones and the increasing quality of digital content.
They also discovered that more than a million people in Japan are addicted to alcohol, compared with an estimated 830,000 people a decade ago.
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