Understanding gambling harms in the digital age

The project will benefit the ACT community and potentially alleviate gambling harm by providing an evidence base about knowledge, awareness and understanding gambling and its harms. The project will provide the basis for a socially grounded approach to public health messaging to improve public understanding of the relationships, health, psychological, financial, work/study, cultural and criminal harms of gambling. It will provide evidence of how messages about gambling are consumed in the digital media environment, and trial and recommend gambling literacy resources. The project will contribute to development of the concept of gambling harm literacy and examine models for measuring the efficacy of gambling harm messages on gambling behaviours.
Through a mixed-methods approach the aim is to address the following questions:
1. What knowledge, awareness and understandings do the ACT community have of gambling and its harms?
1.1. How do particular sub-groups (youth, older adults, women, frequent gamblers, CALD communities, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) understand gambling and its harms?
1.2. How do key experts (doctors, psychologists, counsellors), public health officials, and media producers understand gambling and its harms?
2. Is there an association between gambling harm literacy and gambling harm in the short and medium term?
3. What are the best approaches to enhance public understanding of gambling and its harms (e.g. gambling harm literacy; sociocultural, or advocacy approaches)?
What interventions and resources are needed to enhance public and expert understanding of gambling and its harms?