Factors associated with adolescent online and land-based gambling in Canada

Abstract

Background: With the development of new gambling technology, and increased internet accessibility, online gambling has rapidly emerged as a new gambling market. Governments in numerous jurisdictions have moved to legalize online gambling, yet little is known about the impact of online gambling availability particularly for adolescents. To date, few studies have identified the characteristics of adolescent online gamblers and even fewer have looked at whether these characteristics differ from land-based adolescent gamblers. This study examined socio-demographic and factors associated with online gambling for adolescents and compared this to land-based gamblers to examine whether the profile of online gamblers are unique.

Method: Data for the current study comes from the 2012–2013 Youth Gambling Survey (YGS) (n = 10 035) and consists of students in Grades 9 to 12 from three Canadian provinces: Newfoundland and Labrador, Ontario, and Saskatchewan.

Results: Compared to adolescents who did not have a gambling problem, those who had low to moderate (OR = 2.21, p < .001) or high problem gambling severity (OR = 13.60, p < .001) were significantly more likely to gamble online. Adolescents who played free games were also significantly more likely to gamble online (OR = 2.75, p < .001). Females were significantly less likely to gamble online compared to males (OR = 0.31, p < .001). Other than gender, problem gambling severity and playing free games, when compared to land-based adolescent gamblers, the profile of online gamblers are not that different.

Conclusions: Current prevention efforts for adolescents should focus on gambling across modalities.

Keywords:

• Adolescent
• Online Gambling
• Land-Based Gambling

Acknowledgements

Thank you to the Propel Centre for Population Health Impact at the University of Waterloo for coordinating the implementation of the Youth Gambling Survey. We would like to thank the project manager for this study, Laura Holtby. We thank Sue Steinback for her assistance with referencing and formatting the manuscript. The YGS was funded by the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre (OPGRC Pilot Project Grant awarded to Elton-Marshall and Leatherdale). Elton-Marshall and Leatherdale were both recipients of Investigator Support Grants from the Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre (OPGRC) in support of this research. The opinions expressed in the publication are not to be construed as those of the Centre or the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care. Dr. Leatherdale is a Chair in Applied Public Health Research funded by the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) in partnership with Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction (INMHA) and Institute of Population and Public Health (IPPH).

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the article.

Additional information

Funding

Ontario Problem Gambling Research Centre, [10.13039/501100000050].