Behavioural Addiction in Women

Fulvia Prever is a psychotherapist with a particular focus on women, gambling, and behavioural addictions. She has been an executive psychologist for 38 years in the Addiction Clinic of the Italian NHS in Milan, and she is the Scientific Director of the Women & Gambling Project, SUN(N)COOP, international referee for Women, Gambling & Behavioural Addiction for EASG and ISSBA, and president of the Varenna Foundation.Gretchen Blycker, LMHC, LMT, RYT, PhD candidate, is a board-certified sex therapist in private practice and an adjunct faculty member at the University of Rhode Island. For the last 25 years she has been integrating a holistic framework for promoting sexual wellbeing, healthy relationships, healing from sexual trauma and treating compulsive sexual behaviours as well as addressing their relational impact.Laura Brandt, PhD, is currently an Assistant Professor in Psychology at The City College of New York. To address the complexity of substance use disorders in her research, she draws from psychological, applied medical and data science, and takes an implementation perspective on interventions that target addictive behaviours.

‘The topic of behavioural addictions in women has been significantly under researched at a global level for far too long. This book greatly addresses the research gap in this field and makes essential reading for all in the clinical realm and in research.’Henrietta Bowden-Jones, OBE, Professor, National Clinical Advisor on Gambling Harms, Vice President of the Royal Society of Medicine ‘This is a much-needed book for anyone working in the behavioural addictions field written and collated by some of the leading female researchers and practitioners. If you want an insightful and engaging female perspective on behavioural addictions, then this is the book read.’Mark Griffiths, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Behavioural Addiction and Director, International Gaming Research Unit, Psychology Department, Nottingham Trent University‘This book focuses on global female perspectives on a range of behavioural addictions. There is an important need to understand better girls and women and how they may experience and be impacted by behavioural addictions involving gambling, gaming, internet use, love, sex, pornography viewing, eating and other behaviors. This impressive book includes over 30 chapters detailing aspects of often difficult-to-identify clinical concerns and how they may be impacting the health of women and girls, all communicated from womens’ perspectives. This book sheds new light on many important topics, and provides a lens through which to view these from international vantage points. As such, this is an essential book that contributes to promoting female health and well-being.’Marc N. Potenza, MD, PhD, Director of Division on Addictions Research at Yale, Director of Yale Center of Excellence in Gambling Research and Director of Women and Addictions Core of Women's Health Research at Yale‘Taking into consideration the most important yet most understudied areas of behavioural addictions research, one would certainly point to gender issues first. The current book is a huge step to address this gap. The book edited by Fulvia Prever, Gretchen Blycker, and Laura Brandt provides an excellent collection of papers studying women-specific aspects of behavioural addictions, covering a wide range of perspectives, and with a special focus on aetiology, needs, and treatment issues. Moreover, the global perspective of the book, with contributions from all over the world, makes it especially unique and important.’ Zsolt Demetrovics, Chair of the Centre of Excellence in Responsible Gaming, University of Gibraltar; Head of the Addiction Research Group at ELTE Eötvös Loránd University and President of the International Society for the Study of Behavioural Addictions

• Part 1. AFRICA 1. South African Women Risk-takers Part 2. NORTH AMERICA 2. Women’s Wellbeing: Illuminating the Harmful Impact of a Partner’s Compulsive Sexual Behaviors 3. Clinical Perspectives of Love Addiction & Compulsive Sexual Behaviour 4. Clinical Considerations of Behavioural Addiction in Pregnancy Part 3. SOUTH AMERICA 5. COVID-19 and What was not Grieved in the Woman Addicted to Gambling 6. Intimate Partner Violence and Drug Use in Latin America Part 4. ASIA 7. Family and Social Relationships During Recovery 8. Women, Love, and Sexuality in Saudi Arabia 9. Women’s Pornography Use in China 10. Understanding Repetitive Non-Suicidal Self-Injury and Recovery among Chinese Women 11. Higher Burden of Withdrawal Symptoms, Depressive Mood, Loneliness, Anxiety and Agitation Among Women with Internet Gaming Disorder in South Korea 12. Problematic Internet Usage among Women in Malaysia 13. Food Addiction in the Adult Indonesian Female Population Part 5. EUROPE 14. Shielded from View? Gender-bias in Gambling Research, Prevention and Treatment 15. Gender-specific Personalized Care Delivery for Problematic use of Internet in Switzerland 16. Gambling Disorders among Women with Suicidality 17. Online Gambling in France 18. Buying-Shopping Disorder in German Women 19. Female Gamers 20. Food Addiction 21. Psychological, Family and Behavioral Factors Associated with Emotional Dependence 22. New Therapeutic Tools Dedicated to Women with Gambling Disorder in Italy 23. Innovative Italian Gender Approaches to Diagnosis, Treatment, and Counseling 24. Gambling Therapy International and Multilingual Helpline 25. Gambling in the Life of Older Women 26. Compulsive Sexual Behavior and its Correlates in a Sample of Polish Treatment-Seeking Women 27. The Gendering of Gambling in Sweden 28. Problem use of the Internet and Social Media among Young Women in the Russian Federation 29. The Impact of Internet and Gaming Addiction on Women and Gender Minorities in Sweden and Europe Part 6. OCEANIA 30. All that Glitters is not Gold 31. Women’s Participation in ‘Card Circles’ in Remote Australian Aboriginal Communities