A new study from Rutgers University found that 42.7% of Americans between the ages of 13 and 17 participated in some form of gambling over the past year, with some 11% of teenage gamblers classified as high risk for problem gambling.
More than half, 52.5%, of Americans ages 13 to 27 reported gambling in the past year, according to researchers to the Center for Gambling Studies at the Rutgers School of Social Work.
“We are living in a time where anyone can have a casino or sports book in their pocket,” Lia Nower, director of the center, who led the study, said in a statement. “Now teens who should be playing sports are betting on them, often with family members.”
Researchers surveyed 1,677 Americans ages 13 to 27 and found nearly one in five, or 18.9%, of adolescents aged 13 to 17 gambled at least weekly. This age group was more likely to play bingo, raffles, and games of skill.
The survey also found that risk starts early and isn’t limited to boys. Among gamblers, high-risk problem gambling rates were similar for females (10.7%) and males (9.9%).
Researchers found that racial and ethnic differences were pronounced. Black respondents reported the highest participation in gambling in the past year (63.9%). Among those who gambled, 17.7% of Black respondents and 12.8% of Hispanic respondents were classified as high-risk problem gamblers, compared with 6.4% of white respondents.
Lower household income was associated with the highest rates of gambling problems. Nearly 30% of those who gambled from households earning less than $10,000 annually were classified as high risk for problems, as were 22.8% of those from households earning $10,000 to under $20,000.
Among adolescents ages 13 to 17 classified as high risk for problem gambling, 75.5% had a family member who gambled, 66.3% believed a family member had a gambling problem, and 61.2% had gambled with a family member.
Gambling by family and household members was strongly associated with gambling and problem gambling among young people, the researchers said.
From the overall 13-to-27 age sample, 20.7% participated in sports betting and 18.4% in season-long fantasy contests. According to the report, 14% participated in cryptocurrency trading, 12.9% in high-risk stock trading, 8.5% in social casino, 8.3% in sports betting, and 6.6% in prediction markets.
Approximately 40% of prediction market participants and 41% of social-casino players were classified as high risk for problem gambling.
Nower and researchers at the Center for Gambling Studies recommended that prevention education begin in middle school, providing teachers, students, parents, and counselors with evidence-based information about gambling risks.
They also proposed strengthening oversight of emerging gambling-like products, including prediction markets, social-casino games, and other activities that may fall outside conventional gambling safeguards; establish a federal gambling regulatory agency to set national minimum standards, including national self-exclusion and other safeguards that follow players across online and land-based gambling activities; and fund prevention and treatment where risk is highest by creating an office for problem gambling within the National Institutes of Health, with community partnerships in low-income communities.
