CHANCE Collaboratory
An innovative approach to study the interactions between consumers, digital games and technologies.
About this initiative
Our digital lives are increasingly designed to addict us. In this context, the Collaboratoire pour l’étude des jeux de Hasard et d’Argent Numériques ConnectÉs (CHANCE) operates as a research space designed to critically analyze gambling, video games and emerging forms of digital consumption. By combining experimental methodologies with advanced data analysis, we seek to understand the impact of these games and various social environments on players' behaviour to guide prevention measures and harm reduction practices.
Explore. Understand. Prevent.
We believe in the citizen science movement. Our collaboratory is designed to foster participatory research that invites those from academia and beyond to join in lab-based experimentation and knowledge production. By leveraging our collective knowledge, we aim to develop creative solutions for preventing and treating addiction.
Our mission
To catalyze collaborative research on the digitalization of play, the gamification of consumption and the role of data flows in regulating emergent modes of digital life, play and consumption.
Our impact
In the digital age, gambling plays an increasingly important role in consumers' lives. With mechanisms of immersion and persuasion evolving rapidly, their impact on players' behaviour is becoming increasingly complex to understand.
The majority of current research focuses on populations already undergoing treatment, leaving a significant gap in our understanding of gambling trajectories prior to experiencing gambling-related harm. The CHANCE Collaboratory fills this gap by creating a controlled environment where researchers and experts can observe, analyze and model these interactions to produce recommendations based on scientific data.
We seek to provide rigorous scientific data to support preventive actions and regulation of gaming environments.
Rethinking gambling and gaming through research
At CHANCE, we bridge disciplines to explore the intersections of digital gaming, gambling and society. Our research challenges assumptions and develops strategies to mitigate harm.
- Intersection of gambling and game studies: Digital games increasingly blend skill and chance, creating new forms of play that can encourage compulsive behaviours. CHANCE provides a space at Concordia University for critical engagement with gambling and quasi-gambling games, deepening our understanding of their mechanics and impacts.
- Sociology of gambling: Gambling research has long focused on individual behaviours, overlooking the social and cultural dimensions of play. CHANCE integrates perspectives from media, leisure and sociology to explore how digital gambling is shaped by broader societal factors.
- Gambling studies and prevention: Prevention efforts often rely on psychological models of "responsible gambling." CHANCE expands this approach by incorporating lived experiences and social research to develop harm reduction strategies that reflect real-world digital play and consumption.
By connecting these fields, CHANCE advances research that informs policy, supports harm reduction and fosters ethical game design.