Gambling is an activity where you risk something of value to predict the outcome of a game involving chance. It can be done alone or with friends in a social environment, for example in a casino, and can be a fun way to pass the time. However, it can also have serious impacts on your life.

Like drugs, gambling can change your brain chemistry and lead to addiction. It can cause highs and lows, so it is important to seek help if you are having trouble controlling your behaviour. Psychological therapies can be helpful, such as cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), which can explore your beliefs about betting and what triggers you to gamble harmfully.

Although most individuals report that they enjoy gambling because it provides an enjoyable social activity, some become too involved and develop problems resulting in negative personal, family, and financial consequences. Some people are more vulnerable than others to developing a gambling problem. This includes those who have low incomes as they have more to lose than gain from winning a large sum of money and young people, especially boys and men.

Gambling creates both costs and benefits, but methodological challenges arise when evaluating these at the community/society level. A common approach is to focus on economic impacts, but this ignores non-monetary harms and benefits that are harder to quantify. Other methods include using health-related quality of life weights and assigning monetary values to intangible benefits and costs.