Adolescent gambling has emerged as a growing public health concern in Nigeria, yet limited empirical attention has been given to the psychosocial processes underlying gambling motivation. Guided by developmental psychopathology and motivational models of gambling, this study examined the predictive roles of psychological violence and resilience on gambling motives among adolescents in Ibadan, Nigeria. A cross-sectional descriptive correlational design was employed. Participants were 300 in-school adolescents selected through a multistage sampling technique across three local government areas in Ibadan metropolis. Data were collected using the Gambling Motives Questionnaire–Financial (GMQ-F), the Psychological Maltreatment Questionnaire (PMQ), and the Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale, 10-item version (CD-RISC-10). Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlations, independent samples t test, and hierarchical multiple regression were used for analysis. No significant gender difference in gambling motives was found. Psychological violence was positively and significantly correlated with gambling motives, while resilience showed a non-significant negative association at the bivariate level. Hierarchical regression confirmed that psychological violence alone accounted for 14.2% of variance in gambling motives (Model 1: R² = .142). Adding resilience in Model 2 produced a significant increment (ΔR² = .018, ΔF = 6.24, p = .013), raising total explained variance to 16.0%. In the final model, psychological violence (β = .39, p < .001) and resilience (β = −.13, p = .013) were significant predictors. Post hoc power analysis confirmed the sample provided greater than 99% power to detect medium effects. The findings highlight gambling motives as proximal psychological processes shaped by adversity and protective capacity. Implications for trauma-informed and resilience-focused interventions in Nigerian secondary schools are discussed.
Keywords: Adolescence, Nigeria, Resilience, gambling motives, psychological violence
