Key points:
- The Gambling Commission released a qualitative report on gambling experiences
- The goal was to understand how and why people experience gambling-related harms
The Gambling Commission has published a qualitative research report to provide a deeper understanding of people’s problem gambling experiences in the UK.
This study was carried out by NatCen, with support from the Gambling Commission’s Lived Experience Advisory Panel (LEAP).
The report shares findings from 25 in-depth interviews with people who took part and had experienced serious or harmful gambling effects in the past year.
The main goal of the research was to understand how and why people experience serious gambling-related harms, what external factors may contribute to these outcomes, how different negative effects are connected in their lives and what actions, if any, they took to try to prevent them.
Participants had varied experiences with gambling-related harm, often beginning in childhood or adolescence, either by observing family members or gambling themselves. Financial issues were commonly the first negative impact, though some reported relationship problems as the earliest sign.
The research found that gambling journeys weren’t linear. Some participants saw harms increase over time, others stayed stable, and external factors like income, employment or personal life events often influenced these patterns in different ways.
Other influences included peer pressure, parenting, mental health struggles, financial stress, migration and moving to new places, and exposure to gambling ads.
Concerning this, one male interview participant, aged 25 to 34, said: “The thing about when you work here as a student, you can only work 20 hours per week. When you need to make money, you don't really have a lot of options. Then I think I had maybe a feeling that, okay, maybe I can go back to where I once was [taking part in gambling] and see if I can make money out of it.”
Many described how different harms, like financial loss, relationship breakdowns and poor mental health were connected, often creating a cycle where one problem led to another. Regarding awareness and support tools, the answers varied. Those who sought help used self-exclusion tools, personal strategies like budgeting or support from others, usually after experiencing serious negative effects.
A female interview participant, aged 25 to 34, said: “I feel like I've got a bit more self-control because I know when enough is enough, whereas four or five years ago it would be, oh, okay, another half an hour and that's when I would have kept going. Now, I know about the tools that sites have on.”
Some of the participants expressed how the tools were not useful for them: ‘'Well, we've got these tools and they're there to help you, but I think indirectly they probably know that the actual participant will carry on doing it or even put some more into gambling. So, I don't trust a lot of these so-called tools.”
One of the main conclusions of the study is that gambling often begins positively, but negative consequences tend to develop over time, with some individuals experiencing them more quickly than others.
