Lucas Maghiar had just finished high school when he placed his first sports bet.

“I got into it as soon as I turned 18, all my mates used to do it during school, so I started to watch footy and started betting on that,” he says.

Maghiar bonded with his mates over sports betting, not to mention the thought of making money. “It was fun when we all had the same bet on and the feeling from winning was a massive reason for getting into it,” he says.

His habit started small, putting a multi on an AFL game once a week, but soon he was betting on much more – the greyhounds, horses and the NBA.

The amount of time he spent gambling began to escalate and the losses started to add up. “I 100 per cent lost more than I made, probably north of 10 grand or more roughly,” he says.

Teenage gambling on the rise

According to The Australian Institute, the 20-year-old is one of nearly seven million Australians who gamble regularly, making this country home to the most gamblers per capita in the world. 

The Teenage gambling in Australia report revealed Australians spent an estimated $244 billion on gambling in 2022-2023, losing $31.5 billion.

The report estimated nearly half (46 per cent) of 18 and 19 year olds bet on sport, spending $213 million on gambling. Despite being under age, more than 600,000 Australians aged 12 to 17 gambled in 2022, spending $18 million between them.

Centrecare gambling counsellor Kirsty Mead says young men gamble due to boredom, excitement and the social connection it provides.

“Gambling creates a dopamine hit and builds a relationship with the reward centres of the brain; these things are attractive to underdeveloped brains,” she says. “From the discussions we hear in the community at our primary prevention presentations, sports betting has great social links and provides the same cycle of stress, risk, dopamine, and feelings of loss as playing the sport yourself.”

A report by The Kids Research Institute, published in June, reveals young men aged 18 to 25 are at disproportionately increased risk of gambling problems compared with older males and their female peers. In 2022, 80 per cent of men over the age of 18 gambled compared with 66 per cent of women.

Lead author and senior research fellow Vincent Mancini says young men are particularly at risk if they have low levels of social support.

“Men who are lonelier and who have poorer quality friendships are more likely to fall into these kinds of patterns of problem gambling.”

Vincent Mancini

“One of the concerns that I have as a researcher, and as a mental health professional, is that I think gambling companies know this as well and they’re trying to actually exploit this,” he says.

Mancini believes sports gambling platforms are incentivising group-based betting. “We’re in a situation now where the platforms and technology actually encourage and make it really easy for you to connect with your friends, to put money in a shared kitty and to be able to share who’s betting on what,” he says.

Research from the Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, at the University of Melbourne, shows the number of Australian men betting on sport increased by more than 57 per cent from 2015 to 2022. A decade ago, just 5.9 percent of men bet on sports, rising to 9.3 percent in 2022.

For younger men between the ages of 18 and 24, the rate of betting increased by more than 60 per cent, from 8.6 per cent in 2015 to 14.6 per cent in 2022.

Why young people gamble

Mancini says sports betting has become a way for young men to connect with their friends. “Part of the concern that I have is that there are young men who likely can’t afford to not gamble,” he says. “Because the alternative is, ‘Well, I’ve got nothing to talk about with my friends and there’s no connection anymore because when I do talk to my friends it’s often about sports and odds and who’s winning money’.”

Jack Alexander was in his final year of high school when he started betting on sports. “I had probably just turned 17 and all my mates were doing it and convinced me to start,” he says.

Alexander felt like the odd one out in his friend group if he didn’t have a bet on a game they were all watching. With AFL, soccer and NBA games all running during the week, it was a topic of constant conversation.

The hope of eventually winning something big was one of the drawcards for Alexander, who found it difficult to watch sports if he didn’t have a bet on.

Mancini says sports betting is now a way for people to up the ante and make sport more exciting to watch. “If you’re a football fan and there’s a game where there’s two teams that you couldn’t be more disinterested in, one of the ways to make the game more interesting is to put on a $5 or $10 bet, and all of a sudden what was once a boring game might be one you want to watch and will excite you,” he says.

“I think the industry has been very successful in actually making people feel like they’re not a real fan or don’t really love the sport unless they’re actually happy to put money on it as well.”

Although Alexander still gambles, the 19 year old isn’t spending as much money. “Nowadays I barely bet at all, maybe like $30 a week, if that, but before I was probably gambling like a couple hundred a week,” he says.

“I think I was betting more at the start because it was like, I just turned 18 and thought I was going to win every day but now that I’m older I realise you lose a lot more than you win.”

Jack Alexander

The consequences

Mead says sports gambling requires some level of skill and gamblers tend to bet in larger amounts when they know more about the sport and feel confident they can predict the outcome. But confidence is problematic because gamblers begin betting more than they can afford and feel the need to chase their losses by gambling more.

“We have heard of some clients on their sport’s off season betting on anything they can to fill the void – this is their brain seeking the dopamine,” she says.

Mancini believes the consequences youth gamblers face often aren’t apparent until much later in life. “I think the losses aren’t necessarily immediate, like ‘I had this house and now it’s gone’,” he says. “It might be, ‘I had these plans to live my life in a particular way, and I wanted to travel and to buy a place of my own and move out of home’.

“You kind of miss those opportunities and I think young people are denying and delaying themselves the ability to acquire those assets.”

Maghiar still gambles, though he did give it up for a while. “I didn’t gamble for like six months, but then the footy started up again so I started small and made some big winnings and I would put it all back on,” he says.

While he believes gambling won’t always be a part of his life, he says he enjoys it too much to quit now.

“I’m just a young 20 year old who loves to gamble and drink, so eventually I will [quit], but it does bring more joy out of everyone – especially when you win,” he says.

WA provides free, confidential counselling, support and information services for all people affected by gambling. Face-to-face counselling is available via Centrecare’s Gambling Help W.A. The free Gambling Helpline, 1800 858 858, is available 24/7. For more information please visit https://www.centrecare.com.au/metro-services/gambling-help-metropolitan-and-rural/gambling-help-wa