A Fanduel user navigates the website platform. According to ESPN, legal sports bets increased from 2023’s $11.04 billion to $150 billion in 2024.

Last February, I attended my third Super Bowl watch party since moving to the U.S. in 2022. The game was, obviously, a high-stakes match up. It had my friends screaming at the TV, telling the players to run faster, block smarter and pass cleaner.

But for most of them (aside from one very passionate Philadelphia Eagles fan), the scoreboard wasn’t the only thing on their minds. One was hoping that running back Isiah Pacheco would score a touchdown, another that the Chiefs would score first and a third that the Gatorade dumped on the winning team’s coach would be purple.

Rather than rooting for the Eagles or the Chiefs, they were all backing a third entity: their five-leg parlay.

In 2018, the Supreme Court struck down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, making sports betting legal in the United States for the first time in 26 years. Since then, gambling has elbowed its way into the lives of Americans in an unprecedented fashion, with the nation betting a total of $150 billion through legal sportsbooks in 2024.

Sports games are now peppered with advertisements encouraging fans to sign up now, bet today and win big. These ads are paid for by the companies at the epicenter of this sports betting fervor: DraftKings, BetMGM and Fanatics. Their revenue is growing rapidly, and it seems that they’re the only ones really hitting the jackpot.

Gambling is defined as placing something of value at risk in hopes of gaining something of greater value, whether it’s buying a scratch-off at the corner store, putting $50 on the Red Sox to win the World Series or wagering your car in a game of poker.

In the U.K., where I grew up, and where sports betting has been legal since 1960, betting shops and sports wagers are as firmly ingrained in our culture as tea or the royal family. Betting advertisements are everywhere — but are always accompanied by the slogan, “When the fun stops, stop.” Created by GambleAware, the initiative supposedly negates the dangers of sports betting. When you’ve bet so much that you can’t pay your rent or your girlfriend dumps you, just stop!

And actually, most people will. They’ll close the app, their wallet just $10 lighter, and get on with their lives. But, for 1% of the U.S. general population, “stop” may not be in the cards. These people will develop Gambling Disorder, or GD, a psychiatric condition that has been classified as a substance-related disorder by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders since 2013. People living with GD experience persistent and recurring patterns of gambling behavior — behavior they are unable to control despite its negative consequences.

And, as you might guess, sports betting companies do not care. In fact, their entire brand is built on the promise that you won’t stop — and they’ll employ tactics that foster addiction, hook their users and keep them coming back for more.

The parlay bet is a key piece of this strategy.

A parlay — also known as a combo or accumulator bet — is a wager that combines multiple bets into one, only paying out if each individual wager wins. These individual wagers can range from a combination of smaller bets over the course of one game to the results of several fixtures over a longer period to time.

Although the potentially higher payoffs make parlays a more enticing option than an individual bet, their increased payouts do not make up for the small odds of winning every bet, or “leg.” This makes them a massive source of income for sportsbooks, and in most states, betting companies make between a half and two-thirds of their revenue on parlays alone.

Beyond that simple equation — that longer odds equals more money for sportsbooks — the parlay also allows betting companies to simulate a “near-miss” scenario, wherein a player might win every individual wager aside from one or two. In pathological gamblers, the near-miss activates brain regions associated with wins, meaning that near-miss outcomes may contain both the neurological and functional properties of a win. In other words, even if a player loses, they experience the same dopamine rush as if they had won, encouraging them to gamble again and meaning betting companies can keep players hooked without paying out a single dime.

And the more you play, the more dopamine you release.

A 2017 study found that, when compared with control subjects, individuals with GD had a capacity for dopamine synthesis around 17% higher in various areas of the brain. Additionally, higher dopamine synthesis was positively correlated with the severity of GD and duration of play. This positive feedback loop creates a destructive spiral of addiction and makes it more difficult to “stop when the fun does.”

Additionally, digital apps mean that sports bettors can now place wagers constantly and put their money on short-term events like a field goal. This speeds up the cycle of betting and increases the danger of entering the “dark flow” state often experienced by slot machine players. The slots are notoriously dangerous because of their rapid speed of play, which makes them more addictive than a game of blackjack or poker, in which the time between wager and reward is much longer.

Betting companies also lure customers by offering sign-on bonuses, like DraftKings’ $1,000 deposit bonus offered to customers who sign up with its mobile app. The catch? To receive this bonus, customers must first deposit $5,000 up front and place $25,000 within 90 days on bets that they have a less than 75% chance of winning. That’s $30,000 in three months.

DraftKings, BetMGM and Fanatics all have sections on their websites dedicated to ensuring responsible gambling and allow players to set budget and time limits on their accounts. But these policies all rely on the fact that all players will recognize when it’s time to stop and will have the power to do so.

Gambling has occurred for centuries, but modern-day technology allows users to bet constantly. Gambling companies use techniques like accumulator bets and sign-on bonuses to target and exploit weaknesses in the brain’s reward system.

The issue with the sports betting industry isn’t necessarily the act of gambling; it’s the unchecked commercialization of a habit-forming product with the power to destroy lives, and unless regulators act soon and place restrictions on these companies, the social cost of sports betting will only rise.

Until then, take the time to check in on your friends.

If you or someone that you know is struggling with GD, the National Problem Gambling Helpline offers call, text and chat services 24/7/365 at (800) 522-4700.

Lily Cooper is a fourth-year biochemistry major. She can be reached at [email protected].

If you would like to submit a letter to the editor in response to this piece, email [email protected] with your idea.

About the Contributors

Lily Cooper is a fourth-year biochemistry major and journalism minor and deputy campus editor for The News. She has previously covered Khoury College’s curriculum changes and the university’s co-op problem, and is excited to continue expanding coverage of Northeastern’s campus.