Helping you helps me: Giving and receiving social support in recovery groups for problem gamblers

Mutual aid fellowships are the most accessible and widely used treatments for different addictive behaviors including problem gambling, yet how and why such treatments may be effective remains underexplored. The present research investigated the relationships between recovery group identification, social support received and provided to the recovery group, and important recovery-related outcomes among people attending Gamblers Anonymous (GA). Recovery group identification was associated with increased abstinence self-efficacy and decreased perceived risk in gambling-related ‘trigger’ situations and these relationships were mediated by the perceived provision of social support but not its receipt. The findings suggest that mutual aid fellowships such as GA may be effective in part because they provide opportunities for members to not only receive social support from similar others but also to make a meaningful contribution to other people’s recovery through the provision of social support, which can aid their own recovery. ©American Psychological Association, 2018. This paper is not the copy of record and may not exactly replicate the authoritative document published in the APA journal. Please do not copy or cite without author's permission. The final article is available, upon publication, at: 10.1037/gdn000009