The Gambling Commission has released its Young People and Gambling Report, which is a study conducted each year to help understand children’s and young people’s exposure to and involvement in all types of gambling.
The report was done through conducting research in schools, where pupils filled out online self-completion surveys in class. The sample size of the data was 3,453 11 to 16-year-olds, as well as for the first time in this study, 17-year-olds attending academies, maintained and independent schools in England, Scotland and Wales.
Some of the key findings from this year’s study showed that there were improvements in some of the areas related to the surveys carried out.
Indeed, 26% of the respondents spent their own money on some form of gambling in the last 12 months, which was down from 31% last year.
Excluding arcade gaming machines, 4% of respondents spent their own money on regulated gambling (age restricted) compared with 5% in 2022; 0.7% of the respondents were identified as problem gamblers by the youth-adapted DSM-IV-MR-J screen, down from 0.9% last year.
In 2022, 2.4% of participants were identified as at-risk gamblers compared with 1.5% this year; and, in terms of adverts, in 2023 55% had seen gambling adverts offline with 53% seeing gambling adverts online. Both figures are down compared to 2022, when 66% had seen gambling adverts offline and 63% had seen gambling adverts online.
In response to the statistics, a spokesperson for the Betting and Gaming Council (BGC) said: “BGC members take a zero-tolerance approach to betting by children.
“The most popular forms of betting by children are legal arcade games like penny pusher and claw grab machines, bets between friends or family, and playing cards for money – not with BGC members.
“These latest figures from the Gambling Commission, which incorporates data from 17-year-olds for the first time, and therefore comparisons with previous surveys should be treated with caution, show the number of children aged 11-17 gambling in the last seven has dropped 2% since last year, to 5%."
