NCAA study finds sports betting habits shift with education

Neha Soni January 15, 2025

SiGMA news

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the body responsible for regulating student athletics across the United States, has released a study that highlight the importance of education in changing sports betting behaviours.

The NCAA conducted a survey, fifth in the association’s history since 2004, exploring the gambling behaviours of over 20,000 student-athletes, shedding light on how sports betting trends are evolving among college athletes.

Another survey before the 2024 one was conducted in 2016, which was ahead of the 2018 expansion of sports betting. In 2024 survey, only 22 percent of NCAA men reported placing legal or illegal wagers on sports at least once in a year. This marks a decline from the survey results of 2016, which found that 24 percent of NCAA men placed a wager or more, violating the association’s laws related to gambling.

To add context, with the legalisation of sports betting across 38 states by the end of 2024, the sports betting landscape has changed dramatically for college athletes compared to the 2016 results.

The 2024 report also found that 52 percent of men in the survey have gambled for money within the past year, a figure that has been decreasing since 2008 when 66 percent of NCAA men reported at least one gambling behaviour.

The association, commenting on the decline, said, “This slight drop in the percentage of men placing any bet that violated NCAA bylaws was observed in each of the three NCAA divisions.” The study was conducted on student-athletes across all divisions.

On the other hand, the study showed that women’s participation in sports betting remained relatively stable, with around 5 percent of female student-athletes admitting to gambling in the past 12 months.

Gambling harm prevention: strong objective for NCAA

As compared to the 2016 study, while men’s betting activities have marked a slight decrease, there has been a rise in the number of NCAA athletes being asked for inside information. The new research ties this increase to the expansion of sports betting in the country.

However, also found that the percentage of Division I student-athletes who admitted to knowingly providing inside information in 2024 have dropped compared to 2004 when the surveys began. The study has attributed this positive change to campus educational efforts.

The NCAA had modernised penalties for breaches related to its betting rules in 2023. The association hoped to reduce the stigma related to gambling and hoped to help athletes requiring support instead of enforcing tough penalties like loss of eligibility.

Last year, Charlie Baker, the NCAA President and former Governor of Massachusetts, raised concerns about the impact of sports betting and prop bets on college sports. He expressed his worries so strongly that he urged state authorities to prohibit them. It was a challenging proposition for the flourishing legal sports gambling industry, which saw nearly a 50 percent growth in 2023.

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