Mediernas konstruktioner av spelmissbruk - En diskursanalys av spelmissbruk i svensk dags- och kvällspress

Sammanfattning: In the new information society everything is more accessible, gambling and gaming addiction is no longer place bound. You can now reach the world of gambling from anywhere, and it has become a growing social problem. The mass media is a big part of the information society and has the power to shape and form the reality of gambling and gaming addiction. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to understand the discourses in Swedish day and evening press, how they construct gambling and gaming addiction as a social problem, and which voices in these articles are being heard and what are the significance. We have done this with a social constructionist and discourse analytic approach. The empirical material consists of 32 articles. In the articles we found 4 themes that was central as discourses - who is the addict, care and responsibility, who is the claims maker and the gaming companies. Some of the conclusions we could draw from our study is that the gambler addict is constructed as either a young man or a middle-aged woman. The man can’t really help his addiction but the woman who is ashamed about her addiction is more responsible. When the articles discuss gaming addiction it’s a teenage boy who is the addict. When it comes to care and responsibility a lot of heat is directed towards Svenska Spel, who is a co-creator and profiteer, of the social problem. After reviewing the articles, one group is repeated and shows creditability - the experts. When it comes to the gaming companies its very clear that the articles are portraying the evil side of the problem.