Having a family member or a close friend with a gambling problem puts people at greater risk of developing one, too, a new study finds.
The findings add to a growing body of research suggesting that “when gambling is seen as normal by others, it can increase a person’s own risk of gambling,” the researchers wrote in the Journal of Gambling Studies.
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“It has long been known that alcohol-related problems run in families – this study demonstrates that this is also the case with gambling,” Richard Velleman, one of the study’s authors, said in a news release. “This is an important discovery, as many people don’t see gambling problems as equivalent to alcohol or drug problems, as gamblers don’t ‘ingest’ anything, yet gambling can equally lead to serious problems which cause serious harm to individuals and families.”
The study also found that having strong family relationships can reduce the risk of problem gambling, but strong friendships did not seem to protect against gambling problems.
Gambling addiction is characterized by a “pattern of repeated and ongoing betting and wagering that continues despite creating multiple problems in several areas of an individual’s life,” the American Psychiatric Association says.
About 2.5 million adults in the United States have a severe gambling problem, and about 5 to 8 million more have moderate to mild gambling issues, the National Council on Problem Gaming says.
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The surge in popularity of online sports betting is exacerbating the problem, with one-quarter of sports bettors saying they are concerned that they can’t control their gambling. Wagering on sports was a $150 billion industry in 2024.
One in 10 adults in the United States report having engaged in online sports betting in the past 12 months, a 2025 Pew Research Center Survey found.
For the new study, researchers from Tampere University in Finland and the University of Bath in England surveyed more than 1,500 adults at repeated intervals between 2021 and 2024 about their gambling behaviors and their exposures to people with gambling problems.
Statistical models based on the data show that people who had close relationships with problem gamblers were at heightened risk of developing gambling addiction.
The new paper demonstrates that “gambling-related problems cluster within families and close relationships in ways similar to alcohol- and other substance-related harms,” said Emmi Kauppila, the study’s lead author. “This is not just about individual behavior but about shared environments, stressors and social dynamics.”
