Svenska Spel Suggests Protection Measures to Be Tailored Based on Age Groups

Svenska Spel held its annual responsible gaming research day, a dedicated event organized by the institution’s Independent Research Council. Gathering renowned academics and treatment providers, the event gives updates on studies of gambling harms and player protection measures.

The attendees came up with suggestions that consumer protection measures should be tailored to different age groups. As far as stressed out, mandatory limits have a much better and stronger effect than voluntary when it comes to ensuring responsible gambling activity.

Specific Strategy Needed

The Swedish Public Health Agency advocated the strong necessity of developing age-specific player protection strategies. In addition to this, Stockholm University psychologist, Dr. Patrik Lindner, pointed out that the effectiveness of operators offering voluntary limits is very questionable.

According to the results published by The Public Health Agency, the long-running Swelogs study revealed the growing gambling problem. The study has been tracking the relationship between gambling, money, and health since 2008. The stats show that around half of those that were suffering from some form of problem in 2018 had either not gambled, or not displayed any sort of issues in the 2015 edition.

Svenska Spel’s independent research council was established in 2010. Spending around SEK5m (£411,375/€457,830/$502,654) each year on research on gambling and preventive measures against gambling problems, the organizations puts constant efforts on enhancing the protection and safety of the gaming community.

(Not) Making Predictions

On the other hand, researcher Ulla Romild, clarified that it was possible to predict which consumers show predispositions to develop a gambling problem. One of the suggestions indicates that future preventative efforts should be tailored for different age groups, which would be of additional help in diagnosing the problem.

As far as Romlid declared:

“To a certain extent, it is possible to predict which players will develop ongoing gambling problems. I thought it was clearer than I expected.”

Chair of the Swedish Games Research Council, Sara Lindholm, stated that the results revealed younger people have a bigger tendency to evolve into problems than for older individuals.

Lindholm said:

“They show, among other things, that younger people have a tendency to move between different levels of risk behavior over time, while older people stay at the same level.”

Cross-Sector Collaboration

Lindholm stressed that cooperation between sectors is a crucial factor for ensuring effective responsible gaming measures. Treatment must be tailored to meet the individual needs and consider many aspects, such as the history of risk, and health factors.

Even though the operator may introduce and include an effective safeguard for players…

…players could simply decide to migrate to sites without such measures in place. This is among the main reasons why measures should be more personalized and stringent.

Source:

“Svenska Spel RG research shows need for focus on youth”, igamingbusiness.com, October 9, 2019.