Authors

• Ministry of Social Affairs and Health

Keywords

addiction, adolescents, debts, expenditure, family members, friends, gambling, gaming machines, guilt, lotteries, youth

Abstract

The survey charted the gambling habits of Finnish youth. The term gambling is used here as an umbrella term for lotteries, slot machines, betting, bookmaking, the pools, roulette wheels, and card and dice tables. The respondents were asked to indicate the different types of gambling, betting, and games of chance they had played during the past year. They were also asked how often they usually engaged in the mentioned gambling activities, and whether they usually gambled through a bookmaker or an agent, or on the Internet. In addition, the respondents indicated where and with whom they had gambled, and whether the staff in the gambling venue had asked about their age or did not allow them to gamble. If the respondent engaged in gambling activities more often than twice a month, he/she was asked to estimate the average weekly sum spent in gambling, and the largest sum spent during one day.

One topic pertained to whether any of respondents' relatives or peers had had a gambling problem. The respondents were also asked whether they returned another day to try to win back the money they had lost, whether they ever gambled more than they intended to, whether they had ever claimed to be winning while gambling, even though they were actually losing money, and whether people criticised their gambling or told them they had a gambling problem.

Some questions explored whether the respondents ever felt guilty while gambling, whether they had wanted to stop betting money or gambling but could not do it, and whether they had ever hidden their gambling from their family members. The respondents were also asked whether they had ever argued with people they live with over how they handled money and whether those arguments had ever centered on their gambling.

Other topics included whether the respondents had ever borrowed from someone and not paid them back as a result of their gambling, and whether they had ever lost time from work or school due to betting or gambling. The respondents were also asked whether they had borrowed or stolen money to gamble or to pay gambling debts, and if they had, they were asked to indicate from where/whom they received the money. Finally, the respondents' opinions were probed on whether they had a friend who had a gambling problem, whether teachers, other school personnel, or parents had talked about gambling, whether respondents' parents gambled, and how often they gambled when respondents were present.

Background variables included respondent's gender, age, region of residence, education, available monthly resources, household size, and municipality size.