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- By Laralynn Judge
- Sponsored Storytelling
Prediction markets — platforms where people stake money on the outcome of elections, sports, economic reports and other future events — are rapidly reshaping the online wagering landscape. They're expanding quickly, and they're increasingly accessible to anyone 18 and older through apps and websites that reach a broad, digitally connected audience.
But one question is getting almost no attention: how are these platforms affecting Native youth?
Most of the public conversation is about legality, gaming policy, regulation and growth. Almost none of it is about community impact, and tribal communities are largely absent from that conversation.
“Right now, everyone across the United States is focused on the legal battle, but what we don’t have is the data on societal impact to make our arguments stronger on regulation,” says Prof. Danielle Finn, director of the Indian Nations Gaming & Governance Program at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
A Data Gap in Prediction Market Research
While prediction markets are still relatively new within gaming and online wagering, existing research on related systems suggests they can influence how individuals perceive risk, reward, and decision-making under uncertainty. However, there is still limited research focused specifically on prediction markets themselves, and even less that examines how young adults engage with them in real-world settings.
For Native youth, this lack of research is even more significant. Most studies on gaming behavior, gambling-related activity and emerging digital platforms do not include Native populations in meaningful numbers. As a result, it becomes difficult to know whether broader findings apply within tribal communities or accurately reflect Native experiences.
At the same time, there is still very little understanding of baseline awareness and engagement with prediction markets among Native youth. Whether participation is widespread, limited, or only beginning to emerge is not well documented. That lack of clarity is important because it shows how early this conversation still is and how much foundational research is needed before assumptions are made about impact or scale.
Without this information, it becomes difficult to understand whether prediction markets are influencing Native youth differently from other populations or whether there are unique protective factors within Tribal communities that already shape how young people approach risk, digital platforms, and financial decision-making.
More broadly, policy discussions about emerging gaming platforms are moving forward without research that reflects Native experiences.
Why Prediction Market Research Can’t Wait
Waiting until there's a visible problem before studying it leaves tribal communities reacting after the fact instead of helping shape the landscape while it's still forming. Early research isn't just about spotting risk. It's about spotting opportunity, building prevention, education, and community support into the system from the start rather than bolting it on later.
It also guards against a subtler harm: applying findings from broader populations to tribal communities without knowing whether those findings actually fit Native experiences.
Fund Prediction Market Research Now
Tribal communities have an opportunity to ensure Native youth are not overlooked in conversations about emerging forms of gaming.This is the moment for tribal nations, universities, gaming organizations and responsible gaming institutions to invest in research centered on Native youth.
That means dedicated funding for studying prediction market engagement among Native youth specifically, not folded into broader studies that weren't built with Tribal communities in mind. It means real partnerships between Tribal Nations and universities from the design stage onward, not after the fact. It means working with gaming and responsible gaming institutions so findings turn into actual prevention and education efforts, not just numbers in a report. And it means funding baseline studies now, so there's something concrete to measure future change against. Without that investment, research will continue to move forward while Native youth remain largely invisible in the data used to shape future policy.
Make that investment, and tribal communities get a real shot at shaping the future of prediction markets — instead of cleaning up after it.
As Ashlee Olujic, director of tribal and community engagement at the International Center for Responsible Gaming, puts it, “As prediction markets reshape the gaming landscape, tribal communities have an opportunity to help define the next era of responsible gaming. Rather than asking what needs to be fixed, we can ask what already exists within our communities to support wellness, prevention, and player safety and build from there. That's sovereignty in action, and it may be one of the most important lessons tribal gaming can offer the industry.”
Prediction markets are evolving quickly. Research on their impact in tribal communities should keep pace.
Laralynn Judge (Diné) is a student at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in the Indian Nations Gaming & Governance program, majoring in psychology.
DISCLOSURE: This article is sponsored content created by Native Story Lab for the Indian Nations Gaming & Governance at UNLV’s Boyd School of Law. It was created and published as part of a paid partnership and was not reported by the Tribal Business News editorial team.