Game On: Past Year Gambling, Gambling-Related Problems, and Fantasy Sports Gambling Among College Athletes and Non-athletes

Abstract

College students experience higher rates of gambling-related problems than most other population segments, including the general population. Although Division I (D1) athletes often have more at stake than the average student if and when they gamble (e.g., the potential to lose their athletic eligibility), relatively few studies have assessed the gambling behavior of this population and none have specifically assessed fantasy sports gambling. We conducted a study to examine gambling behavior (past-year gambling, gambling-related problems, and fantasy sport gambling) among a sample (N = 692) of college students at a private religiously affiliated university in the Southwest US. The sample for our study was unique in that approximately 30 % of the participants were D1 athletes. We compared the gambling behavior among three groups based on the athlete status: D1 athletes, club/intramural/recreational (CIR) athletes, and non-athletes (NAs). Compared to females in our sample, males observed higher rates of past year gambling, fantasy sports participation, fantasy sports gambling, and gambling-related problems. Among males, we found that CIR athletes observed the highest rates of past year gambling and fantasy sports participation and D1 athletes observed higher rates than NAs. We did not find differences in fantasy sport gambling and past year gambling-related problems based on athlete status in males or females.

A Literature Review and Gap Analysis of Emerging Technologies and New Trends in Gambling

“…Fantasy sports are "an online ancillary to traditional sports media, which allow fans to assume the role of team manager/owner by assembling a virtual line-up of real-world athletes from professional and non-professional sports competitions" [46] (p. 728). Studies into fantasy sports have a range of foci, including characteristics of participants [47], prevalence [48], gambling behaviour [46,49] and problem gambling [49,50]. Gambling participation and problem gambling studies report increased participation in gambling and problem gambling for male fantasy sports players.…”

Internet-Based Structural Characteristics of Sports Betting and Problem Gambling Severity: Is There a Relationship?

“…Another study found examining a sample of 1556 American college students from 2012 that 12.9% of males and 0.6% of females had participated in Bfor money^fantasy leagues in the last year, and that especially in women, a correlation was found between gambling-related problems and fantasy gaming (Martin and Nelson 2014). In another study of college students participating in fantasy sports, it was found that athletes were more likely to experience gambling-related harm than non-athlete students (Martin et al 2016).…”

Behavioral Markers of Risky Daily Fantasy Sports Play

“…Because players construct their lineups before the underlying games begin, there is a level of uncertainty as to which players will win prizes. Functional similarities between DFS and gambling have led to concerns that paid DFS play might be related to problematic gambling behaviors, an association that is gathering empirical support (Martin et al, 2016(Martin et al, , 2018Nower et al, 2018). However, at present we know little about identifying DFS players who might be at risk for problematic outcomes related to their DFS play in particular.…”