The National Council on Problem Gambling is an organization founded in 1972 by Msgr. Joseph A. Dunne and Dr. Robert Custer, among others. From the outset the Council established two principles that remain in effect today: that the organization would be the advocate for problem gamblers and their families, and that it would take no position for or against legalized gambling.
The National Survey of Gambling Attitudes and Gambling Experiences (NGAGE) is the first national research report on gambling attitudes since the National Gambling Impact Study Commission in 1999. A recent report has revealed US youth with fifty percent of those under 35 years of age had answered positive to at least one of the questions in the survey which indicates they may be at risk of developing an issue with gambling.
Those younger demographic who chose positive to at least one of four questions indicated a risk of problem gambling, compared the numbers to only 10 percent of gamblers over 65 years surveyed.
It was also established that legal restrictions on gambling did little to affect betting habits with 50 percent of adults in Hawaii and Utah where all forms of wagering are illegal reported that they had gambled in the past year. One in five gamblers in the USA said they had placed a sports related wager despite being legal in only two states at the time of the survey.
The report also indicated sports wagering to be high risk for participants with sports bettors being three times more likely to develop a problem than those who did not bet on sports. The stats rise to five times more likely when sports wagering happens every week.
The report claimed that only 12 percent in the survey said they had never gambled. On a positive note 70 percent of US citizens who wager say they have not had any potentially harmful gambling behavior while 7 percent said they had experienced some negative behavior ‘many times’.
