Background: Research indicates that digital gambling, including through online sites and smartphone apps, is an increasing issue among youth. The aim of this scoping review is to identify and map literature exploring how digital strategies are used to market digital gambling products to young people. Methods: This scoping review used the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) methodology, with results mapped to the VicHealth Harmful Industries Digital Marketing to Australian Children framework. The review was guided by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) checklist. Medline (via PubMed), Embase (via Elsevier), Web of Science (via Clarivate), CINAHL (via EbscoHOST), and APA PsycInfo (via EbscoHOST) databases were searched from 2008 to 2025. Title and abstract screening were conducted on 6,069 studies, resulting in 304 articles for full-text screening. After full-text screening, 56 articles met the inclusion criteria for this scoping review. Results: Several included studies described social media marketing as being the prevalent form of promotion of digital gambling products, including sharing of posts and “influencer” promotion of gambling products, with a tendency to normalize gambling behavior among youth. Chance-based mechanisms present in gaming, including loot boxes and simulated gambling, were also described as strong determinants of future problematic gambling. Conclusions: Understanding emerging strategies that gambling companies use to advertise, market, and promote gambling products is essential to provide effective nursing assessment and treatment to young people impacted by problem online gambling.
Searby et al. (Wed,) studied this question.