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Sturgis review recommendation 3 update
Impact of new gambling activities list on the Gambling Survey for Great Britain participation and consequences estimates
Results
Significance testing (using chi-squared tests of independence) was used to assess whether there were any statistically significant differences in gambling participation and/or Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI) scores between those who completed the Gambling Survey for Great Britain (GSGB) activities list compared with those who completed the health surveys activities list1.
Gambling participation
Approximately 63 percent of participants reported gambling in the past 12 months, and this did not differ significantly between conditions (as shown in Table 1: Gambling participation in the past 12 months by experimental condition). However, consistent with our hypothesis, the GSGB Condition identified a statistically significant higher proportion of people who had gambled online, compared with the Health Survey Condition (19.8 percent versus 15.3 percent). The GSGB Condition also identified a statistically significant higher proportion of people who had only gambled online, compared with the Health Survey Condition (3.1 percent versus 1.6 percent) (as shown in Table 2: Online gambling participation in the past 12 months, excluding National Lottery players).
Table 1: Gambling participation in the past 12 months by experimental condition
| Experimental condition | Health Survey Condition (percentage) | GSGB Condition (percentage) | Difference (percentage) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gambling participation | 63.2% | 62.6% | -0.4% |
Base: All participants in survey (Health Survey Condition: 1,051; GSGB Condition: 1,013, unweighted).
Table 2: Online gambling participation in the past 12 months, excluding National Lottery players
| Experimental condition | Health Survey Condition (percentage) | GSGB Condition (percentage) | Difference (percentage) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Online gambling participation | 15.3% | 19.8% | +4.5%* |
| Online only participants | 1.6% | 3.1% | +1.5%* |
Base: All participants in survey (Health Survey Condition : 1,051; GSGB Condition: 1,013).
PGSI scores
Among participants who had gambled in the past 12 months, the GSGB Condition yielded a slightly higher percentage of people scoring 8 or more on the PGSI (5.1 percent), compared with the Health Survey Condition (4.0 percent). However, due to low numbers of participants in this category, our analyses lacked sufficient statistical power to determine whether this difference was significant.
To address this limitation, we expanded our analysis to include a broader range of PGSI scores. We combined the percentage of people who had scored 3 to 7 on the PGSI, with the percentage of people who had scored 8 or more on the PGSI. This approach provided a larger sample size and therefore allowed for more robust statistical comparisons. Subsequent analyses of combined PGSI categories showed that the GSGB Condition yielded a significantly higher proportion of participants scoring 3 or more on the PGSI, relative to the Health Survey Condition (12.9 percent versus 11.0 percent). There were no significant differences between conditions in the proportion of participants who scored 0 or 1 to 2 on the PGSI (as shown in Table 3: PGSI scores amongst participants who had gambled in the past 12 months, by experimental group).
Table 3: PGSI scores amongst participants who had gambled in the past 12 months, by experimental group
| PGSI category | Health Survey Condition (percentage) | GSGB Condition (percentage) | Difference (percentage) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 72.0% | 72.8% | +0.8% |
| 1 to 2 | 16.0% | 14.3% | -1.7% |
| 3 to 7 | 7.0% | 7.8% | +0.8% |
| 8 or more | 4.0% | 5.1% | +1.1% |
References
1 It is important to note that statistical significant doesn’t guarantee practical importance. It only assesses the likelihood of results occurring by chance.
Experimental design and hypothesis Next section
Discussion
Last updated: 17 October 2024
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