BETA partnered with the Department of Social Services to determine the effect of behaviourally-informed activity statements on gambling behaviour in a simulated game. We tested two activity statement prototypes and found participants who saw the activity statements bet less than those who did not. Showing participants clear and easy-to-understand information about their gambling activities empowered them to make informed decisions about how much to bet. This project was conducted under Measure 7 (Activity Statements) of the National Consumer Protection Framework for Online Wagering. In 2022, BETA worked with several academics to co-develop a short video showcasing the results of this project and the value of applying behavioural insights to help improve people’s welfare.
ADDITIONAL TRIAL INFORMATION
Trial start and end date: 3 July 2020 to 31 July 2020
Ethics approval: Bellberry Human Research Ethics Committee, 2020-01-021, 17 February 2020
Keywords: Online wagering, behavioural economics, gambling, consumer protection
Experimental design including randomisation:
A three-arm randomised trial, to be evaluated using gambling data collected through the online experiment and a post-experiment survey. There will be two treatment arms and a control arm.
Randomisation will be at the individual level with a one-third probability of assignment to each experimental arm.
We will recruit 1,500 online wagering participants into the trial.
Participants will gamble for a total of 64 gambles on the simulated online platform. They can choose to not place a bet or bet any amount from 1 lab dollar to 15 lab dollars for each gamble.
Outcome(s):
Primary outcome:
- amount bet (lab $) over 56 gambles (range 0 lab dollars to 840 lab dollars)
Secondary outcome:
- the number of bets made over 56 gambles (the range for this outcome is 0 to 56)
Expected sample size: Each participant will have a one-third chance of being allocated to each experimental arm. Therefore, we expect approximately 500 observations each in the control, treatment group 1 and group 2.
