Does the unavailability of social media affect online gambling behavior? A behavioral tracking data study before and after the October 2021 Facebook outage.

Andrea Czakó, Cristina Villalba-García, Tamás Ferenci, Laura Maldonado-Murciano, Carrie A Shaw, Mark D Griffiths, Zsolt Demetrovics

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Article in Addictive behaviors reports, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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7 authors.

Andrea CzakóCentre of Excellence in Responsible Gaming, University of Gibraltar, Gibraltar, Gibraltar.

Cristina Villalba-GarcíaCentre of Excellence in Responsible Gaming, University of Gibraltar, Gibraltar, Gibraltar.

Tamás FerenciPhysiological Controls Research Center, Obuda University, Budapest, Hungary.

Laura Maldonado-MurcianoDepartment of Psychology, Universitat Internacional de Catalunya, Spain.

Carrie A ShawDepartment of Psychology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada.

Mark D GriffithsInternational Gaming Research Unit, Psychology Department, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, United Kingdom.

Zsolt DemetrovicsCentre of Excellence in Responsible Gaming, University of Gibraltar, Gibraltar, Gibraltar.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Background and aims: Social media platforms have become important in both individuals' personal lives and for commercial organizations (e.g., online gambling operators). However, no previous study has examined how the unavailability of social media affects online gambling. A 6-hour-long worldwide outage of Methods: The study used a dataset provided by Results: Most of the regressions showed a non-significant impact of the outage, and only a few significant (but small) differences were identified where the outage was associated with a lower outcome. In the case of the examined countries, the Discussion and Conclusions: Further research and analysis are needed to explore the relationship between social media use and online gambling behavior.

Indexed as

Behavioral trackingGamblingOnline gamblingSocial media outageSocial media use

Identifiers

PMID41367505

DOI10.1016/j.abrep.2025.100629

PMCPMC12684947

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