When someone is experiencing harmful gambling, the impact on the mental health of those close to them can be profound.52IJERPH | Free Full-Text | Gambling-Related Harms for Affected Others: A Finnish Population-Based Survey (mdpi.com)
Recall: Affected others are people who experience harm as a result of the gambling of someone else.
A survey with family members of people experiencing gambling harm found that almost all of them experienced emotional and psychological harm, and for most this was ‘significant.’53families-living-with-problem-gambling.pdf (begambleaware.org) These harms included:
- Distress
- Anger
- Shame
- Hopelessness
- Insecurity or vulnerability
Although most of what we know about these impacts is from the experiences of adults, Fast Forward research indicates that many young people in Scotland worry about the gambling of people close to them.54New report: Scottish students' views on gambling, gaming, and cryptocurrency - Scottish Gambling Education Hub (fastforward.org.uk)
For more information check out the survey here.