A recent study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) shows that there is a significant trend of linkage between sports betting behavior and alcohol use problems against the backdrop of the rapid expansion of sports betting in the United States.
This two-year longitudinal study indicates that changes in the frequency of sports betting are highly positively correlated with alcohol-related problems, suggesting that the two may reinforce each other, posing a composite risk to participants' health.
The main question of the study is: Since the relaxation of sports betting regulations in multiple states in the US, has the change in public sports betting frequency been synchronized with drinking behavior and its related problems? Based on tracking data from 2022 to 2024, the research team found that such changes are indeed closely related.
The study used a nationally representative sample (totaling 2806) and an additional sample of high-frequency sports betting participants (1557), totaling 4363 adult Americans involved in the survey, with an average age of 49.6 years. Among them, males accounted for 51.4%, and females and non-binary gender participants accounted for 48.6%.
The study assessed alcohol-related problems using the revised version of the "Alcohol, Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test 2" (ASSIST-2), while tracking the sports betting frequency of each participant at different time points.
The results show that during the study period, alcohol-related problems in the overall population showed a slight downward trend (slope = -0.059; 95% confidence interval from -0.090 to -0.028), while the overall sports betting frequency did not change significantly (slope = -0.003; 95% confidence interval from -0.053 to 0.047), but there was significant variation among samples, indicating that gambling behavior may be intensifying in some populations.
Most notably, the study found a high positive correlation between alcohol use problems and the trajectory of sports betting frequency. This means that once someone starts to increase their sports betting behavior at a certain stage, their alcohol use problems are also more likely to worsen, and vice versa. This covariant phenomenon breaks the traditional view of their "independent risks."
The study concludes that frequent drinkers in the sports betting population are a particularly high-risk group that needs attention, and recommends more systematic screening and behavioral intervention strategies for this group. Especially in the context of the continuous relaxation of legal and advertising aspects of sports betting, ignoring its linkage with drinking behavior could pose a hidden but severe challenge to public health.
Researchers emphasize that although sports betting may seem like an entertainment option, if intertwined with alcohol use, it could evolve into long-term psychological and behavioral health issues.
Public policymakers, clinical psychological intervention institutions, and regulatory agencies should consider incorporating gambling behavior into the addiction intervention system and implement targeted mental health support services for high-frequency gambling populations.
