Exploring the Impact of Gambling Advertising: An Interview Study of Problem Gamblers

This study qualitatively explored the impact of gambling advertising on problem gambling by interviewing twenty-five people with current or past gambling problems. Interviews were relatively long and involved the participants’ viewing numerous examples of gambling advertising. A quarter of the participants reported that gambling advertising had no impact on their problems, slightly over half of them reported that advertising had a marginal impact, and one fifth reported a tangible impact. However, none considered advertising to be a main cause of their gambling problems. The negative self-perceived impact was primarily that advertising triggered impulses to gamble. Advertising thus increased already high involvement in gambling and/or made it harder to stick to a decision to gamble less or not at all.