Differences amongst estimates of the UK problem gambling prevalence rate are partly due to a methodological artefact

For over 30 years, prevalence surveys have been the principal methodology for measuring the distribution of gambling-related harm in a population (Volberg, 2004), and have informed debates around whether existing harm reduction efforts are working, both in the academic literature (Shaffer et al., 2004) and in the news (Davies, 2022). Despite this longevity, prevalence surveys have been subject to critical perspectives throughout their use (Doughney, 2007; Nadler, 1985; Roberts et al., 2022; Young, 2013). Here we note that current estimated UK prevalence rates reported in 2022 vary from 0.2% (Gambling Commission, 2022) to 2.8% (Gunstone et al., 2022), which is a level of uncertainty. Previous work suggests that the mode of conducting these surveys can cause some differences, with online rates being higher than in-person (Sturgis & Kuha, 2022), and mobile phone rates being higher than landline (Dowling et al., 2016). This is likely responsible for part of the differential, with the 0.2% rate being from a phone survey and the 2.8% rate being from an online survey. Here we show how part of this differential is due to another methodological artefact: the choice of problem gambling screener.