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Study: Small Doses of Caffeine Best to Stay Awake
Ralph writes "This study concludes that smaller doses of caffeine throughout the day are more effective in keeping awake for long hours, rather than the traditional morning mug of coffee. However, in many cases, myself included, the problem isn't staying awake for long hours, but rather using uptime efficiently. Any known cures for the "laziness disorder" out there?"
Suuure, diet doesn't make it any better, just worse in different ways:
(Diet coke)
Carbonated water, caramel color, phosphoric acid, sodium saccharin, potassium benzoate (to protect taste), natural flavors (vegetable source), citric acid, caffeine, potassium citrate, aspartame, dimethylpolysiloxane. Phenylketonurics: Aspartame contains phenylalanine. Use of saccharin in this product may be hazardous to your health. This ingredient has been determined to cause cancer in laboratory animals.
Other than the obvious saccharin warning on the label, a quick search on aspartame makes me never want to drink a diet beverage again. Not to mention all the horrible things corn syrup can contribute to. I stopped the soda thing not too long ago, and I'm not looking back.
If caffeine was just discovered today, it would be illegal to use in the USA.
It would be a Schedule 1 drug, right next to heroin, cocaine, pot, and peyote.
It satisfies the requirements of addiction, acute withdrawal, and abnormal body functions while partaking of it, along with long-term physiological affects.
When you say you need your fix, you are closer to the truth than you think!
Note-I don't necessarily agree with the above, but that's the way it is.
Dunno, but I find that chunks of 70+% bitter chocolate at regular intervals (every half hour or so) seems to keep me awake till the well after dawn when I play FPS's. Then again, I guess the FPS itself is stressful, so would tend to prolong wakefullness, but still, the chocolate seems to do something.
There's Caffeine, as well as other stimulants (theobromine IRC) in chocolate, so it's not too surprising I guess.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"The website that comes up is long on scare and short on details. Most of the details it has are over a decade old. Sounds to me like a scare the fizzled out. I'll trust the FDA on this one.
(1) Adequate sleep.
(2) Daily exercise.
(3) Sound nutrition.
My personal experience: I'm a total coffee fiend. But since I've followed the above guidelines, I don't go through withdrawal when I skip a day and I don't have mid afternoon sleepiness.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
"Use of saccharin in this product may be hazardous to your health. This ingredient has been determined to cause cancer in laboratory animals."
The NIH did a study on the effect of saccharin use in humans. It determined that it does not cause bladder cancer (the only type observed) if used in moderate doses and for people who used it in very excessive doses, it only slightly raised their risk (this is why Congress removed the label 'use of this product may be hazardous to your health' in 2000. It does cause cancer in lab rats due to a different mechanism (different receptors and enzymes) that does not apply to humans. The benefits to your oral health that saccharin gives greatly outweighs any uncertainty about it causing cancer in lab rats or being 'certified to cause cancer in the state of California'.
Saccharin is just another food product that has been irrationally rejected by the masses due to unfounded potential risks. Just like irradiated food (which can be preserved for a long time without use of preservatives--which are in many cases harmful to your health) and GM crops.
I would think that brewing yourself a nice cup of $YOUR_FAVORITE_TEA every few hours might be good, since it has less caffeine and, depending on how long you let it steep, you can control how much caffeine it has. But then again, I'm only a high school senior and don't work in an office environment.
Also note that, while tea leaves have more caffeine by mass than coffee beans, the resulting liquid has less.
MY_FAVORITE_TEA="Earl Grey"
Unknown host pong.
I have found that vitamin B12 is a better solution to keeping me awake. Not only does it keep you awake, but it keeps you alert as well. There have been numerous studies showing that B12 is good for keeping you alert. In fact, any good (read: not Red Bull or Rock Star, which are basically just sugar and caffiene, which will leave you in a blood sugar drop a few hours after you drink them) energy drink will have a high ammount of B12 in it.