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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.

Published
10 November 2022

Last updated
9 November 2022 - Changes

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Contents

Setting gambling in the context of other risk-taking behaviours

To set the findings for gambling participation in context, young people were asked about their involvement in other potentially harmful activities, such as drinking, drug-taking and smoking.

Over the last 12 months, young people were more likely to have taken part in some form of gambling activity than other risk-taking behaviours, as shown as follows in Figure 20. Two in five young people (41 percent) have drunk an alcoholic drink in the last twelve months, 17 percent used an e-cigarette or vaped, 7 percent smoked a tobacco cigarette and 5 percent took an illegal drug.

Figure 20: Participation in risk-taking behaviours in past 12 months

A bar chart showing participation in risk-taking behaviours in the past 12 months. Data from the chart is provided within the following table.

Figure 20 information

GC_GAMSPEND. When did you last do this activity? Was it...? Summary of gambling in the last 7 days, 4 weeks or 12 months
Base: All 11 to 16 year olds (2,559)
GC_ACTIVITY. Please look at the list below and for each activity, select when, if ever, you have done this.
Base: All 11 to 16 year olds answering who have taken illegal drugs (2,198), drunk alcoholic drink (2,213), smoked tobacco cigarette (2,224), used an e-cigarette and/or vape (2,202).
Note: The chart shows results for different questions asked in the survey, so the responses shown will not add up to 100 percent.

Figure 20: Participation in risk-taking behaviours in past 12 months
Type of risk taking behaviour Percentage who have participated in the past 12 months (results from multiple survey questions, therefore do not sum to 100 percent)
Gambled 50%
Drunk an alcoholic drink 41%
Used an e-cigarette and/or vape 17%
Smoked a tobacco cigarette 7%
Taken illegal drugs (including cannabis) 5%

Across all risk-taking behaviours the participation rate was higher for the older age groups, which is not unexpected as young people approach the legal age for some of these activities. However, there are notably higher levels of participation in risk-taking behaviours among young people who have gambled with their own money in the week prior to taking part in the research. Over half (54 percent) drank an alcoholic drink, 32 percent used an e-cigarette or vaped, 17 percent smoked a cigarette and 16 percent tried an illegal drug.

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Setting gambling in the context of other activities
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