Caffeine, a nerve stimulant in coffee, acts to keep you awake and alert. It also increases your concentration and mental and physical performance. However, since caffeine has become increasingly popular in beverages such as coffee and hot chocolate, there are now concerns over its influences over the body - many of which are not known fully.
For example, health problems such as insomnia, have now been attributed or partially attributed to coffee.Some studies involving teenagers found that fatigue in the morning was experienced more commonly in the adolescents who drank lots of coffee, whereas, another study assessing whether people suffering from insomnia were more sensitive to caffeine found that more people with insomnia did not experience a deep sleep.
In some individuals, the effects of caffeine can last up to 20 hours. This means that some people will have disturbed sleep patterns even when their last cup of coffee was in the morning. However, some have also found that drinking a cup of coffee before bed has no effect on them, perhaps indicating that more research needs to be done in order to fully explain the wide range of effects of coffee on different individuals.
However, eliminating coffee completely also seems to pose many problems for people with insomnia and sensitive people. Withdrawal symptoms are common among people who stop drinking coffee, including anxiety, agitation and headaches, all contributing to an even poorer sleep.
Sources of Caffeine
