Report

Young People and Gambling 2022: Official statistics

Gambling Commission report produced by Ipsos on young people and their gambling behaviour, attitudes and awareness in 2022.

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Published
10 November 2022

Last updated
7 November 2024 - Changes

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Contents

• Young People and Gambling 2022: Official statistics

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• Executive summary
• • Introduction
  • Headline statistics
  • Presentation and interpretation of data
  • Acknowledgements
• Young people’s active involvement in gambling
• • Summary
  • Young people's active involvement in gambling
  • Variations in active involvement in gambling
  • Variations in active involvement in types of gambling activities
  • Prevalence of non-problem, at risk or problem gambling
  • Problem gambling by gender
  • Problem gambling by age
  • Problem gambling by ethnicity
• Experience of gambling
• • Summary
  • Overall gambling experience
  • Overall gambling experience in the last 12 months
  • Variations in gambling experience
• The Impact of gambling on young people
• • Summary
  • How gambling impacts on relations with friends and family
  • How gambling makes young people feel
  • The impact of gambling on sleep
  • The impact of gambling on spending
  • The impact of gambling on schoolwork
  • Experience and impact of family members’ gambling
• Online gambling
• • Summary
  • Young people’s active involvement in online gambling
  • Overall experience of online gambling
  • Online gambling using parent's or guardian's accounts
  • Awareness and use of in-game items in video games
• National Lottery play
• • Summary
  • Young people’s active involvement with lottery products
  • Wider experience of lottery games
  • Buying a National Lottery draw ticket or scratchcard
  • Who young people are with when playing a National Lottery product?
• Games and gaming machines
• • Summary
  • Young people’s active involvement in games and gaming machines
  • Overall experience of games and gaming machines play
  • Who is with young people when they play gaming machines?
  • Types of gaming machines
  • Play in an adults-only area
• The Context for gambling participation
• • Summary
  • Setting gambling in the context of other risk-taking behaviours
  • Setting gambling in the context of other activities
  • Reasons why young people gamble
  • Why young people don’t gamble
  • Who young people were with when they gambled
• Attitudes towards and exposure to gambling
• • Summary
  • Young people’s views on gambling
  • Feeling informed about gambling
  • Being stopped from gambling
  • Young people’s exposure to gambling adverts and promotions and frequency of exposure
  • Content of gambling adverts and promotions seen
  • Whether ever prompted to gamble by adverts and promotions
  • Following gambling companies on social media
• Appendices
• • Applying the DSM-IV-MR-J problem gambler screen
  • Research design
  • Sample profile
• List of gambling activities and definitions
• • List of gambling activities
  • Definitions

Summary

This section focuses on young people’s active involvement and experiences with lotteries and lottery style games. When interpreting findings within this section, it should be noted that legislation changed in 2021 to increase the minimum age that people can purchase National Lottery products (opens in new tab) from 16 to 18 years old, and so the majority of respondents to this survey are below this minimum age.

Definitions

Experience of lotteries and lottery style games

Lotteries and lottery style games includes National Lottery Draws, National Lottery scratchcards, National Lottery Instant win games and other lotteries such as The Health Lottery and the People’s Postcode Lottery. Experience of these includes both spending their own money to play lotteries and lottery style games, as well as experiencing without spending their own money, which might potentially include picking lottery numbers for others or scratching off the numbers on someone else’s ticket or card.

Overall, just under 1 in 10 (9 percent) young people had experience of some form of lottery or lottery style game in the past 12 months. In this context, ‘experience’ could mean getting involved with picking lottery numbers or scratching off the numbers on someone else’s ticket or card. However, only 2 percent of young people had spent their own money on lotteries and lottery style games within this time, with just 1 percent having spent their own money on a National Lottery scratchcard or draw.

It is important to note that most young people were in the company of their parent, carer, or guardian when purchasing a National Lottery scratchcard or draw, and in most cases, they did not make the purchase themselves.

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Last updated: 7 November 2024

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