What are we trying to do?
We want to find out whether the density of gambling venues has an impact on people’s mental health, financial stress, and loneliness in England.

 

Why is this important?
There is evidence from other countries that higher density of gambling venues creates mental health problems and financial stress. However, there is limited knowledge about the effect of gambling venues on people in England.

 

How are we doing it?
We are using information from the Ordnance Survey to find the number of gambling venues in 32,844 small areas in England.

We combine this with information about individuals from the UK Household Longitudinal Survey, which is completed by over 20,000 individuals.

Once analysed, the results will provide evidence about whether the density of gambling venues in people’s local area of residence is associated with their mental health, financial stress, and loneliness.

 

Findings
We expect findings to become available in summer 2026.

 

 

More information

 

 

Senior Programme Lead
Mike Spence
michael.spence@manchester.ac.uk