Hedge Your Bets:

Gambling Harm Reduction

Gift Card Lottery completed: Thursday, February 15th, 2024.

If you won, you will have received an Amazon gift card by email.

Study results will be posted on this website in the Spring/Summer of 2024.

THANK YOU to all participants!! You were invaluable to this study.

Scroll down this page to learn more about the program, or go the programs page.

A free program that will teach you how to minimize gambling harm

The Hedge Your Bets research study, including the pilot studies, have been funded by the Alberta Gambling Research Institute.

What is Hedge Your Bets? Hedge Your Bets is a gambling harm reduction program that will teach you how to gamble safely. The program is free, available entirely online, and can even be done on your cell phone!

Hedge Your Bets can help you to reduce gambling harm or even prevent it altogether. How? By teaching you to monitor your own gambling for possible harmful behaviors. You will learn about the most harmful types of gambling, gambling myths, and gambling motivations. Hedge Your Bets teaches you about random chance and probability so you can understand how odds are calculated. Additionally, you will learn that certain cultural or subcultural values may increase your risk of having gambling problems and how to reduce that risk. Finally, you will learn about other problems that can occur at the same time as, and contribute to, gambling harm.

Hedge Your Bets is a new program undergoing evaluation, meaning we are testing it to see if it works. Because of this, you are automatically part of the evaluation study. Your participation is completely confidential. You will not be asked for your name or location information. You will need an email address to sign up for the program, but if you like you can create a new, entirely anonymous email address for the program. We will assign you a participant number, which will be tied to whatever email address you use to sign up for the program.

Who can take Hedge Your Bets?

You do not have to be a gambler and you do not have to have a gambling problem to participate in this program. Because this program is all about harm reduction and harm prevention, someone who has never gambled before can still benefit from this program. To take the program you must fit into one of the four categories under the heading Participant Category and you must meet all four criteria under the heading Participation Criteria.

Remember, if you choose to take the Hedge Your Bets program, you are automatically part of the evaluation study. Information about your progress through the program will be tracked by your participant number, collected, and analyzed. This will help the program designer to figure out how effective the program is.

Participant Category

To take the program, you must fit into one of the following categories:

be serving a criminal sentence; or,
have previously served a criminal sentence; or,
be the family member or close fried of someone who is serving (or has served) a criminal sentence; or,
be someone who works or volunteers with offenders or ex-offenders.

Participation Criteria

Additionally, you must meet all of the following criteria:

you must be an adult (18 years old or older); and,
you must have internet access; and,
you must be legally allowed to access the internet; and,
you must be able to function in English (as this program is only available in English at this time).

What can Hedge Your Bets do for you?

At the end of the program, you will receive a certificate of completion that you can take great pride in. You can print it and show it to your family and friends. You can print it for, or email it to, your parole officer or probation officer to show your engagement, motivation, and accountability. You may want to show it to an employer, teacher, judge, or parole board member.
You will also have gained knowledge and skills that will allow you to continue gambling in a safe way, reducing the gambling harm you suffer if not preventing gambling harm altogether!
Finally, throughout the program, you will have the opportunity to win some Amazon gift cards:
Phase 1: you can enter to win one of five $20 Amazon gift cards
Phase 2: you can enter to win one of ten $50 Amazon gift cards
Phase 3: you can enter to win one of four $100 Amazon gift cards

If you meet the criteria outlined above, you are eligible to take the Hedge Your Bets Program.

What is the program like?

Hedge Your Bets is a harm reduction intervention program. It will not tell you to quit gambling. Instead, it will teach you about gambling so you can make SMART decisions about your gambling activity.

The program has three data collection modules (you just answer some questions in each of these modules), a program orientation module, and four modules about gambling. The gambling modules are:

Gambling knowledge & attitudes
Gambling fallacies (or myths)
Gambling-related math skills
Gambling problems

Click here to learn more about the Hedge Your Bets Program!

What is the evaluation study like?

The evaluation study is built right into the program. Three of the program modules are specifically for data collection, and this is the data that will be assessed to see if the program is effective. Remember, although we are collecting data about your progress throughout the program, we do not know who you are. You are identified only by the email address you provide and the participant number we assign you.

The three data collection modules are:

The measures module
The assessment module
The follow-up module

You will be required to agree to a consent notice to participate.

You will be able to withdraw from the program at any time. If you choose to withdraw from the program, we will keep and use any data we have collected up to that point.

If you withdraw from the program, you remain eligible for the gift card draw that goes with the phase of the program you were in when you withdrew. For example:

If you start Phase 1 but withdraw before completing it, you can still enter the Phase 1 gift card draw! But, you will not be eligible for the Phase 2 or Phase 3 gift card draws.

Important Note: if you withdraw after winning a gift card (or gift cards), you still get to keep that (those) gift card(s)!!

How long will the program take?

The program will take 5-6 hours to complete, spread over about 8 weeks. There are one-week waiting periods between each of the content modules, so don’t let the 8-week timeframe scare you off! For much of that 8 weeks, you will be just going about your life, waiting until you can start the next module.

Below is an outline of how much time each module will take: