The Gambling Impact and Behavior Study investigates the gambling behavior and attitudes of adults and youth in America, and also estimates the effects of gambling facilities on a variety of local economic and social indicators. Respondents were randomly selected by a national random-digit dial (RDD) through a stratified design by state lottery status and distances to major casino. The study includes three independent, unlinkable data files. The adult and youth questionnaire (Parts 1 and 2) covered areas such as demographic information, geographic region, gambling behavior and attitudes, motivations for gambling, gambling history, a problem-gambling diagnostic assessment, gambling treatment experience, family/marital status and issues, income and financial information, criminal activity, mental and general health, and substance use. Areas of substance abuse examined were the use of alcohol, marijuana, hashish, cocaine, crack, methamphetamine, stimulants, tranquilizers, amphetamines, and speed. The Community Database (Part 3) included the following: geographic locators (latitude, longitude), availability of gaming facilities, gaming spending estimates, employment patterns by industry, unemployment, bankruptcy, personal income, private and public earnings, government expenditures, income maintenance/AFDC, and vital statistics.

Data were collected and prepared for release by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago.Three survey methodologies were used for the adult sample. Telephone interviews were conducted for all but 14 respondents who chose to participate via mail-in questionnaire. Face-to-face interviews were conducted for adult patrons of gambling facilities. The in-person and mail-in questionnaires contained most, but not all, of the questions from the telephone interview.The youth questionnaire is identical to the telephone survey administered to adults with one exception. Section D (the Diagnostic Screen for gambling disorders) was administered to all youths who reported any lifetime gambling behavior, rather than, as with adults, only that subset of gamblers who reported dollar losses above certain limits.The data for the community database includes two variables for latitude and longitude (INTPTLAT and INTPTLNG) which will produce a warning when used in SPSS due to their lengths.In reporting on gambling activities, respondents were asked to include gambling within the United States, District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico, and to exclude gambling in other territories, on ships, cruises, or ferries, as well as other venues on international waters.

The sample for the adult telephone interviews was derived using a national random-digit dial (RDD) design stratified by state lottery status, and distances to a major casino. The distribution of age and sex of the respondent was controlled using the Troldahl-Carter-Bryant method. For the adult patron survey, a random sample of gambling facilities was drawn from two western states, three Mississippi River states, and three northeastern states. An average of 25 interviews per facility at 21 facilities was achieved. The youth sample was drawn from two lists of telephone numbers: List 1 consisted of 5,000 targeted households with youths aged 12-17, while List 2 consisted of 32,000 RDD numbers targeted at all households. The youth sample was also stratified by state lottery status. The community database consisted of 100 communities, which were selected using a simple random sampling without replacement procedure, from among "designated places" as defined by the United States Census Bureau, with populations of 10,000 or more. The community database contains information on the years 1980-1996. The community sample was stratified by distance to major casino and presence of legal gambling.

The universe consists of the civilian household population of the United States aged 16 and older. The telephone subuniverse consisted of those living in households with at least one working telephone line. The universe for the community database is biased toward smaller census designated places with populations of 10,000 or more.

Datasets: DS0: Study-Level Files DS1: Adult Survey DS2: Youth Survey DS3: Community Database, 1980-1996