Public Awareness on Problem Gambling Evolves, but Gaps Remain

Results of a national opinion survey show both progress and room to grow in the general public's attitudes about gambling. The results also help to demonstrate why treatment and prevention advocates remain concerned about the possible effects of the proliferation of legal sports betting across the country.

The National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) this month released the results of the National Survey of Gambling Attitudes and Gambling Experiences, a survey conducted by market research firm Ipsos. The initial national survey sample of 3,000 was supplemented with data from 500 sports bettors in each state, reflecting NCPG's interest in trends among that subpopulation as more states legalize wagering on professional and college sports contests.

The survey revealed a mixed bag of public attitudes about problem gambling. While three-quarters of respondents agreed with the statement that addiction to gambling is a lot like addiction to drugs or alcohol, a slight majority also agreed that this behavior is likely to be a sign of moral weakness (with a greater majority saying it is likely to be a sign of not having enough willpower).

As a society, “We've been thinking about gambling in moral and religious terms for a long time,” NCPG executive director Keith Whyte tells Addiction Professional. “We do have a ways to go.”

Overall numbers

The survey found that 73% of respondents engaged in a gambling activity over the past year. Twenty percent participated in traditional sports betting, while 15% gambled online or via a mobile device.

Among past-year gamblers, 57% said they had gambled only for entertainment purposes and not for the primary goal of winning money. But a higher percentage of sports bettors, especially those who play in fantasy sports leagues, cite making money as their main goal, Whyte says. This is among the factors that raise concern among prevention advocates now that the U.S. Supreme Court has paved the way for states to legalize sports betting.

“States are trying to monetize a population that is already at higher risk for addiction,” Whyte says. “Sports bettors already have double the rates of problem play as other gamblers.”

He adds, “Increased accessibility, increased advertising and increased action will likely lead to increased prevalence and severity of gambling problems, unless we take active steps.”

A higher number of survey respondents said services to treat gambling addiction were available in their community than said services were not available. Whyte says it is important to look at state-by-state breakdowns for this question because it is possible that some respondents mistakenly believe that services are available in communities that actually lack them. There was an even split in the number of people who said they would know or would not know where to go for help if someone in their life had a gambling problem.

Whyte says the data tend to show that people who engage in gambling are more knowledgeable about available services—an indication that much of the information about resources for problem gambling comes directly from the gaming industry.

With March being Problem Gambling Awareness Month, Whyte says it is a good opportunity for addiction treatment programs to begin screening their patients for problematic gambling, which can be a hidden cause of relapse to substance misuse.

State regulatory responses

About twice as many respondents said the government should do more to help people with gambling addiction, compared with those who disagreed with that statement. Whyte says that in the first wave of states that have legalized sports betting, only New Jersey has instituted regulations that meet all five of these principles for responsible gambling that the NCPG issued in 2018:

• Ensuring that any expansion of gambling includes dedicated funds for the prevention and treatment of gambling addiction.

• Requiring operators to implement responsible gaming programs, with components such as employee training and limits on time and amount of money spent gambling.

• Assigning a regulatory agency to enforce the regulations that are enacted.

• Conducting periodic surveys on gambling prevalence, in order to collect data to support efforts to mitigate potential harms from wider access to legal gambling.

• Establishing a consistent minimum age for participation in sports gambling and related fantasy games.

Whyte says some states have legalized sport betting with as few as one of these five regulatory components in place.