Student competition Psychology in the coffee shop THIS drug permeates every level of
society. Around the world peopleare gathering mornings, lunchtimes
and afternoons for the consumption of thestimulant in brown, socially acceptable,
TOM STAFFORD, the winner in the postgraduate
liquid form. People drive, work and playunder the influence. It’s found in factories,
category, investigates the coffee break.
hospitals and even schools. It’s caffeine, ofcourse. The chances are that you, reading
the ritualisation of beverage preparation
this, are either about to have a cup of tea or
that is found among caffeine users, and is
coffee, or have just had a cup. The seeming
receptors and hence lessens the action of
ubiquity of the drug has not stopped further
growth in coffee culture. The coffee shop
spontaneous firing, elevating mood, blood
injection is done with reverential care, so
has enjoyed a recent surge in popularity,
pressure, heart rate and gastric activity. The
many coffee or tea drinkers insist on their
making us all familiar with the difference
precision bordering on fanaticism. Sparks
increase pain tolerance (Keogh & Gerke,
fly if you combine tea, teapot, cup, milk
cappuccino and a frappuccino. In the 1990s
2001). This is just one of the many effects
and water in the wrong way in the presence
global sales of coffee leapt from $30 bn to
of caffeine consumption that are relevant to
psychiatrists and doctors (Paton & Beer,
cognitive effects, but buying and drinking
effort spent acquiring a fix, and investment
in elaborate paraphernalia. The reinforcing
shop culture might have major civic, social
effects of caffeine establish the ritual in the
and interpersonal consequences far beyond
wider context of daily routine, making the
just meaning that I can get a nice cup of
That feel…
So what is in your cuppa, and how does it
work? Tea and coffee both contain caffeine.
By weight tea contains more caffeine, but
Our love affair with coffee has implications
when prepared into drink form coffee will
for a range of psychologists
positive side-effects (Schuh & Griffiths,
1997). Although caffeine has potential as a
drug of abuse, the low cost and widespread
dopamine (Garrett & Griffiths, 1997). This
puts it in a class with the stimulants whose
people can learn to effectively manage their
stimulant properties, but is also known to
action is based primarily on dopamine (e.g.
balancing the effects of caffeine to dovetail
caffeine is comparable to, but less strong
and more subtle than, the action of these
requirements (Weinberg & Bealer, 2001).
It has no trouble passing the blood–brain
Indeed, one review recently declared that
barrier. Within an hour of drinking a cup
of coffee there is probably caffeine in every
Reward, reinforcement and
beneficial, with higher users having better
cell of your body, and traces to be found in
mental functioning’ (Smith, 2002, p.1243).
subjective feelings of reward and heavily
‘Creative lighter fluid’
reinforcement, via receptors in the nucleus
well feted in popular culture that it is not
acumbans (Robbins & Everitt, 1996). We
necessary to eulogise them here. Suffice to
depression, inhibition of gastric secretion,
say that the cup of coffee is inextricably
coffee will strengthen the behaviours that
lowering of neural activity. It is involved
Student competition
café-philosopher to the brown-ring stains
on essays and air of near panic that settles
collective decisions and collective memory
on a department if the coffee lounge is shut
retrievable (Wegner et al., 1991; Weldon,
2001). As people meet, in pairs or groups,
the collective experience of the community
coffee ‘creative lighter fluid’, and there’s
is retrieved and exchanged. The network of
our social links, provide the crucial glue to
individuals influence and are influenced.
‘a mathematician is a device for turning
coffee into theorems’. The experimental
whole. This is ‘the strength of weak ties’
be adopted – whether over grand political
investigation of the cognitive effects of
(Granovetter, cited in Gladwell, 2000).
caffeine stretches from Holck (1933), who
locally about plans for a new bypass – are
found that coffee enhances ability to solve
social grooming functions (Dunbar, 1997).
the reflection of this ongoing, interactive,
chess problems, to recent investigations of
the interaction of caffeine and personality
type. Early results (discussed in Weinberg
creating a civic space and a commensurate
& Bealer, 2001) suggesting that extraverts
might receive more cognitive benefit from
caffeine than introverts, possibly because
creating social networks, and thus in turn
been confirmed (Liguori et al., 1999).
in encouraging civic values (Cohen et al.,
century we might hope that the resurgence
Small worlds, social grooming
comparable resurgence of civic values and
and distributed cognitions
occurs informally, as an inevitable result
relationship with social interaction. Social
of society, and, once drunk, every cell of
situations are based around and encourage
our bodies, so the effects of caffeine are
drug use, while drug use seems to enhance
found at all the levels of description that
advertising everything from evening classes
interactions. Caffeine is no exception.
neurophysiological, cognitive, clinical and
Coffee provides an excuse for – and a spur
to – our need for social interaction.
a social network, which no individual has
a complete map of, so coffee shops become
■ Tom Stafford is at the University of
part of a system of distributed cognition
Sheffield. E-mail: [email protected].
opportunity to recognise the small worldnature of society (Milgram, 1967). A ‘smallworld’ is one in which any pair of
References
Cohen, M.D., Riolo, R.L. & Axelrod, R.
(Watts & Strogatz, 1998). It is small-world
Schuh, K.J. & Griffiths, R.R. (1997).
Dunbar, R. (1997). Gossip, grooming andthe evolution of language. London:
on the train, or similar. Kleinfeld (2002)
Psychopharmacology, 130, 320–326.
Dunwiddie,T.V. & Masino, S.A. (2001).
really do have small-world properties, or
whether we have a bias towards seeing the
Psychophysiology, 38, 886–895.
world in terms of small worlds, a bias that
problem. Society, 39, 61–66.
Watts, D.J. & Strogatz, S.H. (1998).
Garrett, B.E. & Griffiths, R.R. (1997).
Liguori,A., Grass, J.A. & Hughes, J.R.
Regardless of where the truth lies in this
matter, Kleinfeld’s paper points to the
Wegner, D.M., Erber, R. & Raymond, P.
desire we have to create small worlds. This
evening. Experimental and ClinicalPsychopharmacology, 7, 244–249.
helps explain the success of café-chains
Gladwell, M. (2000). The tipping point:Personality and Social Psychology,
unremarkable multinational that sells itself
Weinberg, B. & Bealer, B. (2001). The
as offering a ‘third place outside work and
Paton, C. & Beer, D. (2001). Caffeine:
Habermas, J. (1989). The structural
home’. Maybe as social capital declines
transformation of the public sphere. International Journal of Psychiatry inculture of the world’s most popularClinical Practice, 5, 231–236.
Putnam, R. (2000). Bowling alone:TheJournal of Comparative Psychology,
a spatial bottleneck in our daily routines,
Robbins,T.W. & Everitt, B.J. (1996).
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Das „Superbakterium“ NDM–1 ist noch selten. Aber es zeigt: Das Zeitalter der Antibiotika könnte bald vorbei sein Anne Miller war der Anfang einer Ära. Im März 1942 lag sie sterbend in einem Krankenhausbett in den USA. Sie hatte sich mit Streptokokken infiziert und große Mengen der kugelförmigen Keime waren in ihr Blut gelangt. Wenige Monate vorher wäre sie noch sicher gestorben.
Student competition