Too Much Caffeine May Worsen Stress For Students Hooked On Studying

Students who thin connected java and power drinks to powerfulness done nonstop studying whitethorn beryllium fueling nan very stress, anxiety, and slump they are trying to fight, caller investigation warns.

Study: Caffeine Intake Mediates nan Relationship Between Problematic Overstudying and Psychological Distress. Image credit: PeopleImages/Shutterstock.com

Excessive caffeine intake whitethorn beryllium associated pinch and perchance aggravate psychological distress successful students pinch problematic overstudying behavior, arsenic reported by a caller study published successful nan diary Nutrients.

Background

Caffeine is nan astir wide consumed psychoactive constituent worldwide. Primarily obtained from coffee, caffeine improves alertness, attention, cognitive functions, and capacity during physically and mentally demanding tasks. These properties make caffeine astir celebrated among assemblage students, who sometimes devour power drinks to boost their capacity while studying.

Moderate caffeine intake has been recovered to amended temper owed to its energizing effects. However, existing grounds indicates that excessive caffeine intake tin lead to accrued stress, anxiety, and panic attacks. Caffeine is known to straight enactment connected nan Hypothalamic–Pituitary–Adrenal axis, starring to accrued secretion of accent hormones, potentiation of cardiovascular and neuroendocrine accent reactivity, and consequent induction of wide accent level.

Given nan higher reliance of students connected caffeine intake for capacity boosting and nan imaginable antagonistic effect of caffeine connected psychological distress, nan existent study was designed to analyse whether caffeine intake mediates nan relation betwixt problematic overstudying and psychological distress among assemblage students.

Problematic overstudying, besides known arsenic compulsive studying behaviour aliases study addiction, is an addictive behaviour and an early shape of activity addiction. Such behaviour tin perchance trim functioning successful different life domains and trigger antagonistic wellness consequences.

Like nan characteristic features of excessive caffeine intake, study addiction is associated pinch states of precocious alertness and arousal contempt expanding fatigue, which successful move tin lead to precocious and chronic accent and mediocre value of life. Given these similarities, nan existent study aimed to research nan stress-mediating domiciled of caffeine among students pinch study addiction.

Study creation   

The study included 2 abstracted groups of assemblage students: 436 students successful nan first group and 3421 students successful nan 2nd group, including undergraduate, postgraduate, and PhD students.

The Bergen Study Addiction Scale and Perceived Stress Scale-4 were utilized to measure participants’ study addiction and psychological distress, including stress, anxiety, and depression. All participants were asked to supply accusation connected their regular caffeine intake for nan mediation analysis.

Key findings

Higher levels of study addiction symptoms were linked pinch greater caffeine intake and higher levels of perceived stress, anxiety, and slump successful some groups.

The study study revealed that caffeine intake partially mediates nan narration betwixt study addiction and perceived accent successful some study groups. A akin mediating effect of caffeine intake connected nan narration betwixt study addiction and worry and slump was observed only among students from nan 2nd group.

Study significance

The study suggests that caffeine intake whitethorn partially lend to accrued consequence of stress, anxiety, and slump among assemblage students pinch study addiction. Students who are addicted to studying are much apt to devour caffeine, arsenic observed successful nan study.

The mediating effects of caffeine were mini and partial, highlighting nan beingness of different factors, including excessive efforts, perfectionism, and societal isolation, which whitethorn besides lend to higher levels of perceived stress, anxiety, and slump successful addicted individuals.   

Students see excessive caffeine intake arsenic a coping strategy, arsenic caffeine triggers arousal, improves attraction and alertness, reduces fatigue and pain, enhances mood, and helps distract from problems. However, successful students pinch study addiction, precocious intake of caffeine whitethorn usability arsenic a maladaptive and perchance addictive shape of temper regulation, alternatively than an effective coping strategy.

The study finds a affirmative relation betwixt caffeine intake and slump among students from nan 2nd group, which contradicts erstwhile reports stating that higher caffeine intake is associated pinch a little consequence of depression. However, successful statement pinch nan existent study findings,  prior investigation has reported that higher caffeine intake is associated pinch an accrued consequence of suicidal inclination among displacement workers.

This study suggests that displacement workers devour much caffeine owed to agelong moving hours and slumber deprivation, which successful move increases nan consequence of depression. The existent study findings whitethorn beryllium partially explained by akin mechanisms associated pinch precocious study workload, agelong studying hours, and precocious world accent related to study addiction.

The study did not find immoderate mediating effect of caffeine intake connected nan narration betwixt study addiction and worry and slump among students belonging to nan first group. This mightiness beryllium owed to insufficient statistical powerfulness from nan mini sample size.

Overall, nan study findings propose limiting caffeine intake and promoting patient alternatives, specified arsenic remainder and recovery, to support nan intelligence wellness of students pinch problematic overstudying.

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