Microbetting, Fantasy Sports and Risk of Gambling Disorder: A Scoping Review.

Abstract

The rapid growth of fantasy sports might facilitate constant play and harm. Micro-betting allows constant and impulsive betting, possibly augmenting the risk for gambling disorder. This work provides a rapid scoping review of recent publications regarding micro-betting and fantasy sports betting, including characteristics, prevalence, and causes across different age groups. A search in the PubMed database was set for November 2014-November 2019, with inclusion criteria of human studies and written in English. The search terms included: "Sports betting AND children", "Sports betting AND young adult", "Sports betting AND adult". One hundred and thirty-one references were found and 13 complementary reference was added to the discussion and methods sections. Following elimination of 49 duplicate references and 73 other references deemed not of relevance to the study's objectives, a total of 22 references was selected for inclusion. Current evidence suggests a number of public health problems linked to fantasy sports and micro-betting, including (a) that micro-betting is related to severe problem gambling and impulsivity, (b) frequent participation of high school students in fantasy sports relates to a higher risk of gambling problems, and (c) special control should be exerted on youth regarding access to websites of fantasy football for protecting them of harm.