Staff Writer: Rudy Alston
Globally, 17.9% of young people under 18 reported having gambled last year, according to the NCPG. Some popular gambling companies are online, and because of how easy it is to access services online, 10.3% of young people have reported gambling online, according to the NCPG. 7% of youth have reported gambling addiction in America compared to 1% of adults, according to Yale Medicine, which shows that gambling can be more problematic for teens.
Rainbet and Klashi are both gambling companies that are only online, and they both use practices, especially through advertisements, that can get teens to try gambling and potentially get teens addicted to gambling.
Rainbet advertises mainly using TikTok influencers, and many people who use TikTok are teens. A typical Rainbet video shows someone interacting with other people, and in the middle of the conversation, they announce they are going to play Rainbet. It usually takes 10 seconds for them to win money from games like picking a number from 1to 10, flipping a coin, crossing a road with a chicken, etc. After winning, they just continue their interaction.
They use popular streamers or famous people who act or make music, and sponsor them to promote their business usually through streams. TikTok influencers who are sponsored by Rainbet make short videos, but they rarely disclose the video as an advertisement, which is illegal. Rainbet looks for these famous people because people are more likely to listen to them and try out whatever they are promoting.
“The more subscribers they have, the more valuable they are to advertisers and people who have a product to sell. And so somebody who has 50,000 subscribers is going to be more valuable than somebody who only has five subscribers,” said Ms.Felix, RHHS School Psychologist.
Even if Rainbet is not sure or the influencer is not sure that a part of their audience is underage, those who are underage would see the ads or have already seen them.
“I always see a subtle gamble that someone does on Rainbet on the screen, and their content is definitely catered towards the younger audience,” commented Adrian Bojaxhi, a student who has seen Rainbet ads on Tiktok.
A person’s prefrontal cortex, which is the front part of their brain, doesn’t fully develop until they are 25. The prefrontal cortex controls a person’s attention, emotions, memory, and most importantly, decision-making and self-control.
With their decision-making and self-control not fully developed, it’s easy for someone to be tempted to try something that stimulates the brain.
“Part of our brain is called our frontal lobe. And what that does is it really is helping us make decisions,” explained Ms. Felix, “this frontal part of our brain is not fully developed until you’re in your 20s. Some experts will say age 21. Some experts have even been coming out saying it’s really not until age 25.”
When you gamble, you could potentially develop a belief that is called gambler’s fallacy. Gambler’s fallacy is when a person believes a certain outcome is more likely to happen because it either has not happened or rarely happens, so they bet on it.
Gambler’s fallacy and the prefrontal cortex not being fully developed can create addiction because a teen could believe that an outcome would most likely happen but when it doesn’t, they might want to keep trying because they don’t have full self-control.
“Gambler’s fallacy that comes in with the variable reinforcement in that you’re like, well, I didn’t get it this time, but next time I will,” discussed Mrs.Felix.
Kalshi is a prediction market that allows people to bet on almost anything and is another one of these gambling companies you would see on social media, but what makes their company different is that they aren’t legally considered a gambling company.
Kalshi found a way to label its company as a trading company by designing it to not seem like it’s gambling, but instead, designed it to seem like it’s just betting on predictions, which allows them to avoid paying high taxes like other companies, and Kalshi is able to have people who are 18 use their service while the legal age to gamble in Maryland is 21.
Many forms of gambling are exposed to teens, and a lot of them are ones that people don’t talk about, so there is nothing done about them and no restrictions on them. Multiple students have seen these companies being advertised and a few have said they tried gambling. It can be easier for teens to get addicted to gambling and because there are a few who try them, they could potentially get addicted.