If you're like me, you probably start out your day with a hot cup (or two) of coffee. While we may say that this morning ritual makes us more alert, a new study suggests that this increased alertness is nothing more than an illusion. In a study published in the online journal Neuropsychopharmacology, researchers tested 379 people who abstained from drinking coffee for 16 hours and then were given either caffeine or a placebo. The participants were then tested for a variety different responses to measure levels of alertness.
A new study suggests coffee does not make you more alert.
Image courtesy Henning Birnbaum
Researchers found that caffeine does not increase alertness in habitual caffeine consumers, it simply offsets the negative symptoms of withdrawal. People who consume caffeine often develop a higher tolerance to the stimulatory effects. Those who were frequent caffeine consumers reported experiencing decreased alertness and increased headaches when given a placebo. After they were given caffeine, the alertness levels of the frequent caffeine consumers were not any higher than the non-consumers and low-frequency consumers who received a placebo.
"Our study shows that we don't gain an advantage from consuming caffeine -- although we feel alerted by it, this is caffeine just bringing us back to normal," explains lead author Peter Rogers of the University of Bristol's Experimental Psychology department. "On the other hand, while caffeine can increase anxiety, tolerance means that for most caffeine consumers this effect is negligible."
Read More:
- Coffee Does Not Make You More Alert - About.com Biology
- Coffee Consumption Unrelated to Alertness: Stimulating Effects May Be Illusion, Study Finds - Science Daily
- What Are Stimulant Drugs?
Comments
Luckily I have never liked coffee myself, I am a Tea drinker being english
. I read a study a while ago that compared people who had drank coffee and those who had not and those who did not drink were able to perform better, I think it was about staying up late all night; it was better not to drink coffee.
I love coffee, every morning when I get started,the first thing I do is brew a bodum of french. When I go out to meet a friend I enjoy a starbucks late’ I grew up drinking tea, but as I got older I much enjoyed a european blend of java over a cup of earl grey.
Interesting fact: Coffee and Tea both contain antioxidants which have been proven to aid in fat loss.
However I admit I need to research more about whether it does make you more alert.
There are so many ’sample’-type studies that I, personally, do not place confidence in a study unless I know how many people were studied, and how they were studied, and by whom they were studied, etc. Many ’studies’ do not really qualify as anything but a survey of opinions, today.
Love, Armand
I think this study is misleading. It tests for the affects of caffeine on alertness rather than coffee and should not be presented as a study on coffee.
Many People favour coffee over tea as a caffeine boost. But infact, tea has more caffeine per gram than coffee. However, There is more caffeine in the average cup of coffee than there is in a cup of tea, as coffee granules are higher in quantity in a cup it than teabags