A meta-regression analysis of 41 Australian problem gambling prevalence estimates and their relationship to total spending on electronic gaming machines

Table 3 Meta-regression analyses of the prevalence of problem gambling and moderate-risk problem gambling. Parameter estimates have been exponentiated and should be interpreted as prevalence ratios, analogous to odds ratios

Estimates of α and β coefficients and descriptive statistics	Problem gambling			Moderate-risk problem gambling
	Weakly informative	Informative	Fixed	Weakly informative	Informative	Fixed
Intercept	0.004 [0.002, 0.006]	0.004 [0.002, 0.006]	0.003 [0.002, 0.006]	0.021 [0.011, 0.042]	0.019 [0.010, 0.036]	0.016 [0.008, 0.032]
% HDI lost on EGMs and at casinos	1.35 [1.04, 1.74]	1.33 [1.04, 1.71]	1.29 [0.98, 1.72]	0.94 [0.66, 1.34]	0.95 [0.68, 1.32]	0.97 [0.69, 1.37]
Years before 2015	0.99 [0.94, 1.04]	1.00 [0.96, 1.05]	1.04 [1.02, 1.07]	1.00 [0.93, 1.08]	1.02 [0.96, 1.08]	1.05 [1.02, 1.09]
Administered face-to-face	1.02 [0.59, 1.78]	1.02 [0.60, 1.74]	1.08^a	1.17 [0.55, 2.53]	1.33 [0.71, 2.55]	2.07^a
Used SOGS	2.37 [1.37, 4.00]	2.18 [1.42, 3.34]	1.62^a	1.20 [0.57, 2.52]	0.99 [0.55, 1.76]	0.59^a
Monthly frequency threshold	1.26 [0.68, 2.34]	1.15 [0.68, 1.84]	0.97^a	0.67 [0.28, 1.58]	0.81 [0.54, 1.20]	0.87^a
Fortnightly frequency threshold	0.65 [0.28, 1.50]	0.74 [0.43, 1.31]	0.91^a	0.65 [0.21, 2.15]	0.67 [0.45, 1.01]	0.68^a
Weekly frequency threshold	1.21 [0.86, 1.66]	1.10 [0.82, 1.47]	0.67^a	0.77 [0.49, 1.20]	0.68 [0.50, 0.94]	0.57^a
τ	0.37 [0.26, 0.51]	0.37 [0.25, 0.50]	0.46 [0.35, 0.60]	0.55 [0.40, 0.73]	0.53 [0.39, 0.70]	0.59 [0.44, 0.75]
R ²	0.65 [0.29, 0.89]	0.66 [0.31, 0.88]	0.47 [0.00, 0.71]	0.00 [0.00, 0.41]	0.00 [0.00, 0.44]	0.00 [0.00, 0.30]
I ²	0.87 [0.78, 0.93]	0.86 [0.78, 0.93]	0.91 [0.86, 0.95]	0.97 [0.96, 0.99]	0.97 [0.95, 0.99]	0.98 [0.96, 0.99]

Notes: 95% credible intervals are indicated in square brackets. Estimates where the 95% credible interval does not include 1.0 are indicated in boldface, except where coefficients are fixed. ^a indicates a coefficient that is fixed a priori rather than being estimated from the data. n = 41 for problem gambling and n = 40 for moderate-risk problem gambling. Problem gambling is defined as a PGSI score of 8 or more or a SOGS score of 5 or more. Moderate-risk problem gambling is defined as a PGSI score of 3 – 7 or a SOGS score of 3 – 4. HDI household disposable income, EGM Electronic Gaming Machine, SOGS South Oaks Gambling Screen, PGSI Problem Gambling Severity Index