- June 16, 2025
- Gambling
During the past 3 years, Dr. Grubbs and his research team at the University of New Mexico have verified that increased sports betting has a direct correlation to increased alcohol consumption. And furthermore, the tendency is for those who imbibe more frequently, their betting behavior becomes riskier. Listen in as Dr. Grubbs and Shane discuss a wide range of sports gambling topics and dive further into this shocking link between alcohol and sports gambling
Engage with Wager Danger:
Call Gateway Foundation: 844-975-3663 (DONE)
Follow Gateway Foundation:
Facebook: @RecoverGateway
LinkedIn: @Gateway-Foundation
Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER
Text GAMB to 833234
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
There are two types of sports gambling that are especially problematic, and that’s in-play betting, in-play betting is always a red flag and then parlays.
Shane Cook
Welcome to Wager Danger, a podcast where we discuss gambling addiction and recovery. I’m your host, Shane Cook. The gambling disorder program director at Gateway Foundation. And on this episode, we’re joined for the second time by Doctor Joshua Grubbs, a clinical psychologist at the University of New Mexico who has just completed a three year research project following over 4000 Americans and their gambling behaviors.
Shane Cook
Fresh from presenting his findings to the global Addiction Conference in Istanbul, Doctor Grubbs reveals some startling discoveries that should concern anyone involved in sports betting or who knows someone who is. We’ll uncover why sports gamblers drink at rates 4 to 5 times higher than non gamblers. Why confidence in your betting knowledge might actually be working against you, and how certain types of bets, particularly in-play betting and parlays, are creating disproportionate harm.
Shane Cook
Doctor Grubbs also explains how sports betting has become woven into the social fabric of young men’s culture. Complete with leaderboards and social media integration that’s unlike anything we’ve seen in gambling before. More importantly, he shares his vision for evidence based interventions that could help people recognize when their fun is becoming dangerous before it’s too late. Welcome back to the show, Josh.
Shane Cook
Good to have you join us again.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I thank you so much for having me, and glad to be with you.
Shane Cook
Yeah. Really enjoyed the first conversation we had. And at the end of that, we talked about getting back together. It’s been about a year and a half. I went back and looked. It’s been about a year and a half. I know you were completing some research. Within that time period. So I do want to. I do want to dive into that a little bit.
Shane Cook
But first of all, I want to hear about this recent trip. When we reconnected, we started planning for getting together today. You said. Yeah, I’d love to do it, but let me get back from Istanbul first. So tell us a little bit about your trip over there and what you were doing.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. No, I mean, we’re at this moment, I think, globally where, it’s not just the U.S. is talking about behavioral addictions. It’s not just, the US that’s dealing with sports wagering or gambling or those related problems. It really is a global topic right now. And so there was a conference. It was the global Congress. It’s called the Global Congress on the Behavioral Addictions.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
In Istanbul, which is basically was a conference in one of the largest addiction professional societies in Turkey. And it was focused really on clinicians and treatment providers working throughout Turkey. I think it was 5 or 600 clinicians were at the conference, in addition to several thousand that were streaming it live online, where there was just a lot of conversation around various behavioral addictions.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And so I was brought out to talk a little bit about my work in with compulsive sexual behavior, but also to give a talk about sports wagering. And in fact, we had experts from Brazil talking about sports wagering and Canada and Italy and, Finland and Sweden. And so there was several experts from around the globe that were there to talk to this audience about sports, gambling.
Shane Cook
Yeah, that’s fascinating, but I assumed that people were having these conversations elsewhere. But it’s interesting to hear on a global scale that they’re bringing people together from different backgrounds, different cultures, exploring what differences there might be and what they’re seeing in this. Behavioral health field.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
What’s fascinating, I mean, there’s certainly differences that are happening because different countries have gone about this in different ways. And you’re right, it wasn’t just different countries. We had economist and psychologist like myself. We had, psychiatrist. We had various other professionals there. There were even politicians there from Turkey to, to kind of learn about this. So there there are certainly differences.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Certain countries regulate differently. So for example in Turkey they only have like one specific sports betting regulator. I mean operator that is sanctioned and it’s basically state owned. Right. Whereas in the US we have all these different ones. But one of the things that is striking though, when you have these conversations globally is the degree to which there’s similarity to this is an activity that’s really appealing to young men.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
It’s an activity that is, seeming increasingly enmeshed with the sporting itself. Right. So, you know, you see soccer players with, you know, logos on their jerseys depending on what league they’re in that actually are for, you know, betting operators, you know, the folks from Brazil talking about how extreme the betting is across all aspects of sporting events in general.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Now, much like we see in the US too, you can’t even watch sporting events now without getting ads for for betting or odds or things like that. So yeah, there’s differences. There’s a lot of variety of backgrounds, and there’s also these kind of central themes that are emerging on a global scale.
Shane Cook
Okay. Yeah. I just, I’m out of curiosity that the presentation, the the topic you were talking about with them, what did that revolve around?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. So some of it, was actually probably what I talked about on the podcast last time, just the basic who’s betting on sports in the U.S, what’s predicting it, who’s having problems, things like that. We also focused a lot more on some of our longitudinal findings that we’ve been doing, or kind of published on recently, over the past year, year and a half of what we’re observing over time.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
What are the trends, what are the how are things shaking out? And what are the things that we should be aware of, as you know, researchers, clinicians, policymakers and who’s at risk for problems associated with sports gambling. So there there was a kind of a smorgasbord of things I was talking about with them, but really focusing on on the problem gambling aspects of sports wagering and who’s having problems and how those problems are shaking out over time.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right.
Shane Cook
Okay. Well, that’s kind of where we left off in our previous episode. And and where you were expecting that you would be able to come back on the show and we’d be able to talk about not only who’s gambling, what’s going on with gambling behaviors, but how over time those behaviors have affected them individually. So this seems like a great place to jump in and start talking about that.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. No, we we have been. So you know, I probably mentioned this last time, but we started in spring of 2022 with this big national project, talking to over 4000 Americans about sports, gambling and gambling behaviors. And we got basically the way we did it was we got a just a sample of Americans, regardless of whether or not they sports gambling or not, because we wanted to see who transitioned into gambling or out or how sports gamblers compared to non sports gamblers.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
But then we got a bunch of extra sports gamblers in the sample, just so we could kind of study them over time. And then we followed up with them every six months for two years, through spring of 24. And then now we’re just following up with them once a year. So we just actually had our third year of data collection wrap up.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Okay. In spring of 25. And, you know, we’ve been tracking these folks and talking to them and seeing what’s going on in their lives. And so, you know, long story short, surprise, surprise to people that are gambling on sports more seem to be more likely to report concerns about problem gambling or symptoms of problem gambling, since most sports gamblers don’t have problem gambling symptoms.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right. But when you look at sports gamblers, compared to non sports gamblers, there are more, proportionately more sports gamblers that do have problems. Right. So I can say yeah, the majority of people that gamble in sports don’t have any problems. And yet we’re still seeing between 10 and 20% of them are at least at moderate risk for gambling problems.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Okay. Which is way higher than non-sports gamblers where we see tend to be 5 to 10% are at risk of problems.
Shane Cook
Right, right. So that that is interesting and I think in a lot of circles, people that I talked to, the assumption is, is made that there is riskier behavior among sports gamblers and therefore, it makes sense to I would you said 10 to 20% in some cases. That’s a pretty high end. It is at 20%.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right. This is, you know, self-reporting symptoms on the problem game gambling screening inventory. So it’s a DSI, which is just a measure screening for. So, you know, these aren’t people that would necessarily meet full criteria for gambling disorder, but they are answering these questions in such a way that would put them at a higher risk category. Right now.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
To me, yeah, that is high. And when you think about the nature of who your sports gamblers are, they’re younger men. The other thing, and we can certainly talk more about this. One of the things we’ve been really diving into is the extent to which these folks are engaging in really risky drinking behaviors. Okay. So you combine that, you know, a lot of alcohol use while they’re betting, it’s not super surprising to me that they’re at a higher risk category.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Now, the positive side of this is that over time, people that are in higher risk categories tend to move to lower risk categories, which is this phenomenon we see in all addictions. Sometimes people get out of control and need treatment. Some people start to see themselves getting out of control. They’re like, okay, I gotta dial this back. And that’s drinking that substance use.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
That’s gambling too. A lot of people go through what we call natural recovery, which is great. I mean, that’s that’s wonderful. It would be terrifying if they didn’t. Right. But we do see, over the two year period, a lot of the folks that are experiencing problem gambling symptoms by two years later have cut way back on their gambling, and have calmed down.
Shane Cook
So, yeah, I assume you’ve got, you know, you’re collecting data from all these people through questionnaires that were, questions that you’re asking them. Do you think that that is highlighting it for them in some way that they it kind of snaps them out of it. It’s like, hey, maybe you should take a closer look.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah, yeah. This is a question that we deal with a lot in research, right. So I’m a clinical psychologist. I do therapy and assessment outside of the research context, like in much the same sense that a mental health professional might where we’re testing for disorders or things like that. And one of the things that we know in the clinical work we do is we often I’m often when I’m teaching students, tell them that assessment is intervention, which is a fancy way of saying just asking about a problem is often enough to start intervening on the problem.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right? So the question is, well, what does that mean for research? And it’s almost an impossible question to answer because how else can we know what’s happening with their gambling symptoms if, we don’t ask about them? So there’s no way to have a control group, right? Like, well, we’re not going to ask this one about their gambling symptoms.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
We are going to ask this one about their gambling symptoms. In the two years later, we’re going to see who has the most gambling because inherently we’re asking about gambling symptoms. So we don’t have a control in that regard. I do suspect that that’s part of it. I do think people taking the time to take inventory, especially when someone’s buying them every six months saying, hey, how much gambling you did in the past six months, right.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I think that that’s possible. I mean, I do think over the population level because we’re I mean, we’re talking about 4000 Americans that are, you know, a majority of them are recreational gamblers of some sort. I don’t think the effect is huge. I mean, I think it would be different if we were bugging them every day or every week.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I think spreading it out over six months, we’re probably not doing a ton of intervention in that space. Right. But it is it’s almost impossible question to ask, because you are right that when you ask people to take inventory of their gambling and we’re not just asking you, how much are you gambling, we’re asking why are you and how much have you lost?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
What motivates you to gamble? Do you gamble when you’re sad? We have like, this whole slew of questions. We really are probably promoting a little bit of introspection on their focus.
Shane Cook
All right, that’s fair, but but it’s also, you know, probably a good idea at some level to just create the awareness for somebody who might be.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
To me, I think a lot about. So I’m a clinical psychologist, which means that a lot of the times when we’re intervening with people that have problem gambling, we’re interviewing on the individual level, right? Which means I see you once it’s gotten so bad that you feel like you need to talk to a therapist about it. And frankly, from a public health perspective, we need to start before that.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
We we don’t need to wait until they’re in a bad enough situation that they need a therapist to help them with it. We need to talk to people or get them thinking about their own behaviors long before that. And so to me, like getting getting the random gambler to take inventory of what they’re doing with their gambling behaviors, of why they’re doing it, of how they’re approaching it, is actually probably a far more useful exercise.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
You know, if I can get 200 gamblers to to think about how they’re gambling now, that’s probably going to be fewer gamblers that show up in my practice later needing help because they took inventory sooner. And so, again, these larger scale interventions. So surveys are one way of doing that. But you know, in general, I think any any sort of public outreach to get gamblers to think about their behaviors is a net positive.
Shane Cook
Yeah. Well that’s interesting. Because I, we focus at least in our organization and across the state, I should say, with other providers that are focused on, on sports wagering and gambling in particular. What I’ve seen happen where we’re out doing outreach within a public space could be at a sporting event, could be at VFW Hall as well.
Shane Cook
I mean, it could be pretty much anywhere. And we’re out there talking to the public about problem gambling and creating an awareness. And oftentimes people start to reflect and share their own experiences. Of maybe it’s them, maybe it’s somebody close to them that they know. So, you know, I think it’s one of those things the more we talk about it with people, the more, awareness is created, the more self introspective thinking takes place on their part.
Shane Cook
And you know what’s not? There’s nothing wrong with that.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
No, no, I mean, I’m a big, big advocate for for public facing awareness, facing sort of interventions because, you know, the old adage, right, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. And I think that that’s undoubtedly true. The more that we can do to prevent people from needing to talk to a therapist or needing to go to a GA meeting, the better off we all are.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And it’s not to say that, I mean, we could do as much awareness as we want with as much public kind of facing stuff. I think there are going to always be some people that struggle, but if we can make that number smaller, that’s better.
Shane Cook
Yeah for sure. All right. So going back to the research then in terms of trends and things that kind of developed through the overall project and the research search project over the over the last three years, what are some of the things that stand out for you.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right. Yeah. And so I probably alluded to this the last time I was on a little bit, but the one of the big things we’ve been focused on has been this link with alcohol use. Okay. You know, gamblers always have drink a little bit more than the general public, which is not surprising. This is kind of a, finding we know from all sorts of mental health research that the vices go together, if you will.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right. So the types of behaviors that have that potential and they tend to go together. And there’s lots of people that recreationally drink without problems. Lots of people that recreational gamble without problems. Some do them both at the same time with our problems. But the sports gambler link is is absurdly high.
Shane Cook
Really.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Like we’re seeing the, you know, rates of binge drinking that are 4 to 5 times as frequent. We’re seeing over time the, the trajectory of alcohol problems, sports gambling frequency are really closely related to each other so that over the two year study, if you increased your sports gambling, it was very likely that you started developing more problems with alcohol along that time.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Not everyone, but, the likelihood went way up because of it. We’re seeing we have another paper we just wrapped up showing that, you know, sports gamblers are reporting, you know, drinking and gambling simultaneously at 3 to 4 times the rates of non sports gamblers. Right. It just in. So a lot of you know I’ve talked about this in other settings before and people are like oh so sports gambling is making people drink.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And I’m like I don’t think it’s that. I think it’s when you think about what do you do when you watch sports in most countries? But certainly in the US, like drinking is part of sports culture, right? Right. You watch sports at a sports bar, you watch sports at a friend’s house. I had a barbecue, at a tailgate, even at the stadium.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Alcohol is part of sports culture. And we know from past research and this is, I mean, incredibly obvious, right? Sports gamblers watch more sports. So what do you do when you watch sports? Well, for a lot of people, they drink. A lot of people they drink the whole time they’re watching sports. So it’s not that sports gamblers are just being like, yes, I’m going to get completely blasted every single night because that’s just who I am.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
No, it’s why I’m sitting down to watch how these games play out, because I have money on all of them. And what am I going to do while I’m watching? Well, I’m gonna have a couple beers, but you do that every day, and that couple beers turns into 4 or 5 beers. You’re talking 30, 40 drinks a week.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And from an addiction research perspective, we know, you know, if you’re averaging 30 or 40 drinks a week, that’s that’s a problem. Even if you’re not having DUIs, even if you don’t feel like you’re getting drunk that much alcohol in a week consistently has a lot of health impacts. And so those are the types of things that we’re we’re really focusing on now is we do think that there’s a potential that sports gambling at a societal level might be raising, alcohol related problems just because of the increase in drinking while engaging in the behavior.
Shane Cook
That is fascinating. So what was it along the way that kind of gave you this, I guess? What was the intersecting point here in the study where you started noticing this?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. So I mean, it was like we we were going to measure alcohol to begin with because I was curious, but we we published a paper a couple years ago, and we showed that alcohol problems were just higher in this group. And that started conversations at the center that I’m a I’m a researcher at the Center on Alcohol, Substance Use and Addictions here at the University of New Mexico, which historically is one of the bigger and more prominent alcohol research centers in the country.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And that’s what most of my colleagues do here is alcohol research. And as, as, so I’m kind of in that alcohol research culture. Okay. But what it really came down to, I was just kind of thinking I was, you know, we’d been measuring alcohol in our study in alcohol use, and I think it was.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
It would have been a couple of years ago now that the idea started, I think it was during March Madness. I was watching games with friends and like, you know, we always met at a bar to watch the games. And even if you were watching the daytime or at the bar, like you’d have a beer and like, again, you know, I recall like that was the first time in years, that I had had like five beers in a day.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And I’m not trying to say like, oh, I just. Right. I never drink, but I don’t drink that much. It’s just not my thing. And so like, I was over the course of like eight hours, I mean, it’s March Madness, right? But I remember I was like, I drank more that day as someone that doesn’t like drinking that much and that doesn’t gamble.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I drank more because I was watching sports all day and I was like, you know what? We know that sports gamblers are watching more sports, so I bet you they’re drinking more. And that that started leading to kind of this escalation of research questions and looking at the data that we had. And then one thing kind of led to the other, you know, once we kind of saw that initial link to the mapping them over time and all those sorts of things, and so that’s kind of where it developed.
Shane Cook
Yeah. No, that’s that’s interesting. Makes a ton of sense. I mean, what you describe is every Super Bowl, every March Madness, an NHL playoffs, I mean, you name it, it’s, it’s out there. So, what has been people’s reaction to that when you start? Because it’s not something that I would necessarily cut that would come to mind.
Shane Cook
That linkage there. Right. Because I’ve experienced it. But what was it that that was kind of the tipping point where people were like, and I guess more importantly than that, is how did the people that are participating in this research study react after kind of making that connection?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. No. Yeah. So the, the, the reaction within the research community has been largely positive and in real way. I’m trying to think how to word this the historically psychiatry clinical psychology substance use research domains have not necessarily taking gambling as seriously. And there’s a lot of reasons for that. For them though, seeing this overwhelming link between sports gambling and alcohol has been clearly motivating to more alcohol and other substance use, researchers to be like, okay, so no, we do need to take this seriously.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
So I do think for them it kind of solidifies how real these issues are. Okay. Which on the one hand, yeah, it’s kind of a shame that it takes out, you know, substance to get their attention. On the other hand, I’m glad for the attention. Right. Sure. Among the people, you know, when I talk to sports gamblers, most of them are not surprised at all.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
They’re like, well, yeah, I drink a lot when I’m betting on sports. And so this has led you know, we haven’t done this research yet, but it’s led to some ideas that we have to move forward with of like I do think helping sports gamblers see that connection might be an important intervention point for both the drinking and the sports betting.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right. Because I’ve had conversations one on one with sports gamblers. I’m like, well, what happens when you’re drinking and betting on sports? They’re like, more likely to make really stupid bets, right? And that’s how they frame it. Yeah. And that’s an interesting motivating because one like as a gambling researcher, I don’t want them making stupid bets because they’re, they’re more likely to to get in over their head.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
They’re more likely to lose money, they’re more likely to create harm.
Shane Cook
And can spiral really quickly. Josh, I mean, you know, you got game betting going on there. And you’re you’ve been drinking 2 or 3 packs here and all of a sudden you’re making just seriously crazy bets that a reasonable person might not make.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right. Well, and I’ve had I’ve heard I’ve talked to sports gamblers that are like, oh no, I put it, I put in a bet that I would have never made it sober me. What was the word he’s like? Sober me would have never done that. Right. And it’s like, So they can see the connection there. In most sports gamblers, I mean, if there are some my conversations with sports gamble.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
So not necessarily from this research study, but actually just talking with sports gamblers, the majority, the ones that I’ve talked to are aware that in-play betting never turns out the way that it seems like it’s going to, and the ones that drink and that are like, no, I’m aware I’m more likely to make stupid decisions in that situation.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And so to me, this is an exciting kind of intervention point because it’s like I if I can say, hey, maybe we should cut back on drinking while gambling because you don’t want to make dumb bets and that cuts down on the drinking and it cuts down on the gambling related harms. Right? I mean, it’s one of those at the end of the day, in-play betting is in my opinion, one of the scariest forms of sports betting because it does play off of that impulsive tendency to chase something, right?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. You know, if you’re if you’re out there saying, you know, each weekend I put $20, or have or whatever your number is on these teams to win and these teams to lose, that’s a much more thoughtful process than getting a bump notification on your phone that says, here, put money down. Now, what happens on that next play?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right? And it’s not to say that both can’t be problematic, because both certainly could be. But things that involve more planning and forethought are less likely to spiral out of control, right?
Shane Cook
Right.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
You’re more likely, you know, again, people don’t necessarily get into as much trouble betting with things that they’ve planned out beforehand. It’s the things that they do when they’re trying to chase their losses. There are or in sports betting since, like, they’re feeling like they’re on a hot streak and they’re really amped up and they’ve had a few beers, so they’ve why not go double or nothing on this next play?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Because everything else has worked out fine. Right? Right. And so things that slow the betting process down or prevent impulsive decision making, I think are huge for preventing gambling related harms from sports betting. Right?
Shane Cook
Yep. Makes sense. I’m curious in your research, when you, this might be a good reminder for everybody when you talk about sports betting, do you also include that the the parlay games like, the underdog or, one of the. So you lump that into the sports betting arena.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
So we, we broadly differentiate within our research. The big broad categories are sports gamblers versus not so people that gamble versus those that don’t. But within sports gambling, we, we do tend when I say sports gamblers, I tend to mean people that are betting on sporting events. I differentiate them from, say, daily fantasy or regular fantasy play, although we do study all three of those categories.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Okay. But then within the sports gambling domain, we do look at the different types of bet. And I mean, I can tell you I mean, the overwhelming body of research makes it clear there are two types of sports gambling that are especially problematic. And that’s in-play betting. In-play betting is always a red flag. And then parlays, okay.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Parlays are the most associated with problems, people that are just betting over unders or just betting the moneyline wager on games, like who’s going to win or what’s the point total going to be these kind of pre-game bets that they’re locking in beforehand. Yep. Tend to have fewer problems than the ones that are stringing together parlays or the ones that are betting in game.
Shane Cook
Okay, yeah. Because from my understanding that, that parlay betting, where it’s the only feature of the sports gambling app, has become very popular. Yeah. Parlay last couple of years.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right? Yeah. I mean, this notion of stringing together multiple bets, I mean, parlays have such an interesting history. So for years in Ontario, you could bet on parlays even before sports gambling was legal. And the reason you could is the lottery commission had regulated them. Okay. And I think that that tells you something, right. Parlay is are not some sort of skilled gambling thing based on knowledge and this and that.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And the other parlays are stringing random things together in the same way that a lottery would be. Right? Yeah. In the same sense. Random numbers getting drawn parlays or stringing together all these different bets, and then they all have to hit. And, you know, one of one of my students who does a lot of research in this domain, who also gambles on sports himself, talks about how parlays are a suckers bet, like they they’re always the sucker’s bet.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
But they look so amazing because parlays are the bets where you could put down $10 and make a thousand, right? Right. Like that’s that’s how they’re set up. The odds are so insane on them that you can really blow up money that you weren’t, you know, like a small amount of investment could theoretically play out as a massive, massive payout.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And yet, statistically, the likelihood of that happening is virtually nil. Just like the lottery.
Shane Cook
Right? Yeah. Interesting. Well, I was, curious about that. That’s why I asked so, appreciate that. So in, in terms of your current body of work that you kind of wrapped up over these three years, do you consider that your, a starting point for next round or what? Where do you go from here?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
We’re we’re still, you know, polishing on that data and we do have a series of projects that we’re hoping to go to from here. So, I bits a lot of the big things that we have going on right now are understanding how gambling motivations relate to this stuff over time, and how gambling cognitions, or cognitive distortions around gambling.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
So basically, erroneous beliefs around gambling. Okay, relate to these things over time. One of my students, the one I just mentioned, his name’s Alex. He’s extremely interested in gambling knowledge because we know, sports gamblers have a very deeply held belief that they can figure it out, that they can come ahead, that they can play the statistics and win, that they can learn enough.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
They can know enough to get good enough at it. Right? Right. And it’s complicated, you know, we know for like, for example, if, if you think you can figure out a slot machine, what you’re wrong, like, literally, it’s an algorithm. There’s no way to figure it out. But in premise, you would think for sports there should be some knowledge component that matters.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
But everything that we’re doing with research there now shows that, no, it doesn’t matter. It’s, you know, it doesn’t seem to help. Yeah. And what’s really fascinating, and one of the papers he’s working on right now is show it doesn’t matter how much you know, but if you think you know a lot, you’re more likely to have problems.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Like the more confident you are in your own knowledge, the worse you tend to do. Which is fascinating. It’s this classic Dunning-Kruger effect of thinking you’re an expert when you actually are. So we’re doing that. I, I am really personally invested in the alcohol and sports gambling stuff. So we’re working on several projects related to that now, proposals for new projects, trying to really delve into what’s driving the links between alcohol and sports betting, and where are the points that we can intervene.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Because I do truly believe for the people that are engaging in risky versions of both, that if we can reduce one, this other one will one reduce as well. So if we have a risky drinker who’s also sports betting in risky ways, I think if we reduce the risky drinking, the sports betting will also go down. Okay. So that’s kind of one of my main areas.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And, you know, another big area for my lab is we have one of my other students is working a lot on how these motivations play out for sports gambling, because sports gamblers are motivated differently than slot machines players and lottery players, they seem to be a lot more achievement and, financially motivated than those other groups are.
Shane Cook
Interesting. Okay. And that’s just based on the the profile of the gambler, the information that they’re providing. Right. Okay.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
All right. Yeah, yeah. There seems to be this thing going on right now with sports bettors. You know, I’ve never talked to a slot machine player who said I just wanted to be the best slot machine player I could be. I wanted to prove to my friends that I was the best at slots. Right. This is not something you tend to hear.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
But sports gamblers, that social hierarchy status kind of proving that you’re good at this, posting your bets and showing how good you are at your bets. There’s a social component to it that I’ve not seen in other forms of gambling before. Maybe, maybe a little bit with horse racing. But like, that’s probably the closest analogy I could say, where there’s clearly some sort of ego boost, like some sort of status that they seem to feel like they get right from proving that they’re really good at this.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And that type of motivation is, is kind of new for gambling. I mean, I’ve seen it in, you know, day traders and cryptocurrency trading, but sports gambling, it’s it’s kind of in that same category. Yeah.
Shane Cook
I would say maybe another one that falls into that category might be poker players.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. Poker’s a good one. Where there’s this there’s clearly this status that comes by proving how good you are. Right. And sports seems to be in that same genre. But there is a more social media component to it now where a lot of sports betting apps now let you join groups with friends, where you’re, you get to see each other’s bets and how successful you are and compare yourself to being whether you’re better or worse than your friends.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Yeah. Which is like, you know, having a betting leaderboard to be the best at betting is just, a fascinating kind of component that, you know, as much as it may have been involved in other types of gambling in the past, I don’t think that social media integration, I don’t think I’ve ever seen it with another type of gambling.
Shane Cook
Okay. I, I haven’t seen that. So, yeah, I mean, it makes sense that they would do that and have I, I would figure on like a fantasy sports book that, that it would be easy to show who’s a leader. Yeah. You know, show a leaderboard. But I haven’t seen that, so, yeah. It makes sense that they have it to me.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
You know, it’s certainly a growing component. And this goes to a larger piece of, kind of body of work that my student Alex is doing around this notion. Of sports betting is because it’s becoming so culturally normative. It seems that a lot of sports bettors view that as a kind of a key part of who they are as people, which is different.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right? Again, you don’t have someone saying like llama slots player, that’s who I am, right? But sports gamblers, it’s clear that for not all of them, but for some of them, especially the avid ones like no, no, that’s that. If you ask them to describe themselves, Sports Gambler would be one of the things they might say, right. And that’s that’s an interesting I identity aspect that that’s a part of how enmeshed it’s become with our sports culture, where fandom and gambling have become so blended that and it’s become part of the social fabric in fraternities and in a lot of kind of young men’s kind of, groups, that it’s clear that identifying as a
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
sports gambler is the person type of person that gambles on sports and does this is having these social dynamics associated with it that we haven’t seen with a lot of other forms of gambling.
Shane Cook
Wow. Very interesting. Now, I think the work you’re doing is so fascinating, in general. So I appreciate you sharing all of this with us. What’s what’s next for you guys?
Where do you take it? I mean, you already you alluded to where you’re taking it next, but, you know, big picture idea. Where you where are you trying to take this?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I mean, the big picture is right. You know, I want to I want in the over the next five years for us to have, evidence based interventions that can be rolled out to sports gamblers easily. And so that’s, that’s a, you know, kind of an obtuse thing where way of wording it. But what I’m what I mean is I want us to know the types of messages, the types of activity, the types of warnings, whatever those might be, that we can roll out via cell phones, via, podcast ads, via things like that, that will actually make a difference in sports betting behavior.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
You know, if I could wave my magic wand, I would say, no, we’re going to make all forms of sports betting illegal other than just pregame betting. There’s no parlays. You can bet on the over under and you can bet on the moneyline the end period. Okay. Right. That that’s what I would magically do. But that’s never going to happen because that’s how our society works.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
So I want to know the types of things that we can get in front of people that will make them think about what they’re doing. And I want us to be able to kind of say that to have evidence to point that out. And that is that’s probably the five year plan. I mean, the short term plan is really understanding when the problems are starting for people, you know, is it is it when they start drinking and betting?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Is it only when they’re betting in-game? Is it when they start to identify too much as a sports gambler, like, you know, there’s all sorts of untested hypotheses we have, but we really want to find those moments where it shifts from fun to dangerous, or at least the range at which that happens, because I don’t think it’s a single moment.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And then figure out once, once we know where that point is, how to get messages in front of people before that point, and minimize harm.
Shane Cook
Yeah. I love that plan. Are you fostering more relationships with organizations like National or NCPG? National Council on Problem Gambling and I yeah, I was, I assume ICRG is involved there somewhere to.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Very tight relationship with the International Center for Responsible Gaming, do a lot of work with the Kindbridge Health Behavioral Health Network, which does a lot is also within CPG. We also I’ve had several conversations with operators. And this is controversial, right. Because the the industry wants to make money. But I, I have had several, several conversations with, you know, the responsible gaming wing of Bet, MGM or or FanDuel or whoever, right?
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
These different operators, I don’t know what they’re doing with the recommendations that we’re making, but, I think talking to them matters as well. Sure. You know, it’s my interest and their interests don’t always align, and that’s okay. But I do want them to know, okay, here’s what our evidence shows. And I do think, I mean, some operators have actually expressed interest in, in piloting some of these interventions on their platforms because they know, I mean, at the end of the day, operators know that if they’re creating lots of problems in people’s lives, eventually that’s going to come back to haunt them.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Right? Right. And so I do think that that some operators are actually quite interested in more responsible gaming initiatives and more activities that prevent people from from going too far down the rabbit hole, so to speak. And so, you know, talking to all of those. And then I do a lot of conversations nationwide, with various state boards, you know, talking to the local conferences, local regulators, local politicians at various states about what we’re saying as well.
Shane Cook
Interesting. So, so when you say that, are you all right? Yeah. Are you working with the gaming board of particular states in that. Yeah.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
So in some cases, yeah. You know, sometimes it’s just talking to there, you know, most not most, there’s many states have like a annual conference or training for providers in the States. I’m always just going to those. Yeah. Sometimes it’s talking to the boards of the state, to the regulators of the states. I mean, I do think, you know, and this is always controversial in the U.S, but I do think we need federal regulation of sports gambling.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Because I think having, you know, 38 states with legal sports, gambling with 38 different sets of rules is maybe not the best way to do it. But a lot of states are really actively, you know, trying to do to do as good as they can with this thing being legal. And so Ohio, I’ve done a lot of work with Ohio.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I’ve had conversations with folks in Indiana and Massachusetts. I mean, I’m in New Mexico. I’ve talked to folks in New Mexico as well. And so there are a lot of states that are very interested in, you know, making evidence based policy recommendations. Okay. Within the state.
Shane Cook
That’s great. That’s great news. So any final thoughts, Josh? Yeah. You want to.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
I mean, I think this is a space that, you know, folks need to be thinking about and paying attention to. You know, obviously if they’re listening to this podcast, they’re already probably a little bit aware of where gambling can go wrong. But I do think that we just need to continue to raise awareness. And even if you’re just an audience member listening to something like this, you can do that awareness we often think of as public campaigns and speeches and advertisements and stuff like that.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
But, really, one of the best ways that awareness gets raised by things is by normal people having conversations with other normal people. Yeah. It’s, you know, I feel like there are days that I think I have made a bigger difference having conversations with. So I, I train in jujitsu and so I’ll roll with these guys. It’s, you know, it’s a little violent, but we’ll be chatting afterwards about sports gambling and they because they know what I do and we talk about the pitfalls of it.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
And sometimes I think I make more of a difference one on one, having those conversations with normal people that aren’t thinking about research or treatment but are just like, oh, that’s a good thing to think about. And so that’s something that everyone can do. And so if you’re listening to this podcast, if you’re concerned about it, you know, just talk to people about it.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
That makes a bigger difference sometimes than anything I can publish or talk about or yell from a rooftop.
Shane Cook
Yeah. Great advice Josh. So good to see you again. I’m glad you had some time. And you can come on and, spend the time with us and share what you’re up to. Yeah. Let’s check in again. And another year and a half.
Dr. Joshua Grubbs
Sounds good.
Shane Cook
We love hearing from you. So please take a moment to like, share and comment on our podcast. You can reach out to us directly via email at Wager Danger at Gateway Foundation dot org. Look for us on Facebook and Twitter at Recover Gateway, on LinkedIn at gateway Dash Foundation, or through our website at Gateway Foundation. Dot org. Wage or danger is supported through funding, in whole or in part through a grant from the Illinois Department of Human Services and the Division of Substance Abuse Prevention and Recovery.
And remember, recovery is a lifelong process. If you are a family member or is struggling with a gambling problem, call gateway at (844) 975-3663 and speak with one of our counselors for our confidential assessment.
Seeking Understanding | Problem Gambling and Harm Reduction Resource Fair
