African American gamblers: are they willing to participate in health research?

Despite its severe consequences, gambling disorder is under-researched and under-funded especially among African Americans (AA). We had the opportunity to evaluate gambling among a community sample of AA gamblers and to assess whether gambling impacts their interest in, willingness to participate in, navigation to, and enrollment in health studies. AA recruited into the HealthStreet community engagement program between 2014 and 2017 (n=2,661) were asked by Community Health Workers about their gambling behaviors and for which types of research studies they would volunteer. Chi-square tests and t-tests were calculated by gambling status for demographics, perceptions of research, navigation to and enrollment in health research. About 34% of the sample (n=911) endorsed lifetime gambling. Compared to AA non-gamblers, AA gamblers were more “definitely interested” in participating in research, more willing to volunteer for three types of studies, and did not require additional remuneration to be enrolled in a study. Though AA gamblers are more willing to participate, they are less likely to be enrolled into health research than AA non-gamblers. This suggests that AA gamblers face increased barriers to enrollment and that researchers may not be using the right avenues to approach and enroll AA gamblers in health research. African American gamblers: are they willing to participate in health research? Amy L Elliott*, Nathan D L Smith, Catherine W Striley, Mirsada Serdarevic and Linda B Cottler Department of Epidemiology, College of Public Health and Health Professions, College of Medicine, University of Florida, USA *Correspondence to: Amy L. Elliott, Department of Epidemiology, College of Public Health and Health Professions, College of Medicine, University of Florida, 2004 Mowry Road, PO Box 100231, Gainesville, FL 32610, Tel: (352) 273-5468; E-mail: amy.elliott@ufl.edu