Report

Young People and Gambling 2023: Official statistics

Gambling Commission report produced by Ipsos on young people and their gambling behaviour, attitudes and awareness in 2023.

---

Published
16 November 2023

Last updated
16 November 2023 - Changes

Document actions
Print or save (opens in new tab)

Contents

• Young People and Gambling 2023: Official statistics

---

• 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
  • Awareness and use of virtual money or tokens to bet on sports matches
• 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 do not 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

Headline statistics

26 percent of 11 to 17 year olds spent their own money on gambling in the twelve months prior to taking part in the survey.

During that period, the most common types of gambling activity that young people spent their own money on were legal or did not feature age restricted products, namely:

• playing arcade gaming machines such as penny pusher or claw grab machines (19 percent)
• placing a bet for money between friends or family (11 percent)
• playing cards with friends or family for money (5 percent).

19 percent of young people were spending their own money on regulated forms of gambling (which includes some activities that are legal and played within licensed premises), and 14 percent on unregulated forms of gambling (gambling activities which fall outside the remit of the Gambling Commission).

The youth-adapted problem gambling screen (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 4th Edition - Multiple Response Juvenile (DSM-IV-MR-J)) identified 0.7 percent of 11 to 17 year olds as problem gamblers, 1.5 percent as at risk gamblers and 23 percent as non-problem gamblers.

Three in ten (28 percent) young people had seen the family members they live with gamble, with 14 percent indicating that it had resulted in arguments or tension at home. Just over one in ten (11 percent) said that their own gambling had led them to talk to their parents about how they felt while 6 percent said that gambling had made them feel uncomfortable around their friends (such as feeling embarrassed or feeling friends would not approve).

Previous section
Introduction Next section
Presentation and interpretation of data

---

Last updated: 16 November 2023

Show updates to this content

No changes to show.