Caffeine Is a Psychoactive Drug - Research Paper Example

? Drug Report: Caffeine Mira Costa College Shauna Duncan Health 101 Melissa Conrey Assignment Issue 4/20 Assignment DueDate: 5/11/2011 Caffeine Caffeine is a psychoactive drug that serves as a stimulant that increases energy and alertness of an individual. It was originally created by plants in order to ward off insects, but soon became something for humans through the developments of time. “For human consumption we concentrate the caffeine, either through extraction (coffee brewing) or add it directly (sodas and other foods)” (Unknown, 3) Human beings have been using caffeine in their diet since the Stone Age—chewing on seeds, roots, bark, and leaves of plants to acquire energy for their daily activities. Later this turned into the creation of a form of tea by steeping these items in boiling water. The Chinese emperor Shennong, according to Chinese legend, reigned in around 3000 BCE and found out that when leaves fell into boiling water a “fragrant and restorative drink resulted”(Yu, 35) leading historians to believe that this also aided in the discovery of tea/caffeine use for regular usage. In 900 BCE, “The Greek historian Homer mentions a bitter drink that is capable of warding off sleep. This was probably strong brewed tea.” (Unknown, 14) Coffee was discovered later on in the 9th century by a goat herder who observed his goats eating berries from a tree that made them more alert and awake. (Yu, 54) At this time, coffee beans were already being used and ground into fat in North America. This substance became a staple for religious practices due to the fact that coffee helped them stay awake longer. As mankind became more and more advanced and developed, society began to see the use of caffeine in more daily use. A German scientist named Friedlieb Runge first synthesized caffeine in the lab. Since then, scientists and pharmacologists have learned how to create and extract the chemical and properties of caffeine from the coca bean and put it into commercial and medicinal use. In today’s society, caffeine is most commonly seen in the use of coffee, energy drinks, candy, etc. Unknown to society is that caffeine is one of the most abused substances across the world and has properties in it’s mechanism of action that can create possible problems for both short term and long term use due to the pharmacokinetics of caffeine and it’s mechanism of action. Caffeine is a stimulant which when it interacts with certain receptors in the body. Specifically, caffeine impacts systems such as the central nervous system and other physiological systems in the body. The typical route of administration is oral and is usually found in consumer food products, but has also been isolated in pill form as well. The chemical nature of caffeine is that it is lipid soluble. Because of this property, caffeine is able to bypass the blood brain barrier and have a direct effect upon the neural synapses in the brain. Primarily, caffeine is an antagonist on the adenosine receptors in the brain. This means that caffeine physically binds to the receptors in the brain causing a release of adenosine into the synapses. This can cause the secretion of norepinephrine and dopamine to occur. Norepinephrine is a stimulating neurotransmitter that is most commonly associated with the “fight or flight” aspect of the sympathetic nervous system. Dopamine is a pleasure and rewarding chemical that is regulated by many different reward pathways, but the most common one consists of the dopamine being secreted in the ventral tegmental area and it proceeding on a pathway to the prefrontal cortex through the nucleus accumbens. The rewarding effect is one of the ways in which an individual becomes addicted to the drug. Physiologically, a person can experience the associated “crash” once the drug is no longer in the system since caffeine has a half-life of approximately four hours. In order to achieve the same effect, the user must continue to use more and more of whatever caffeine source they are using in order to achieve the same desired state (Spiegel, & Fatemi, 2003). As stated, caffeine is a stimulant meaning that it increases many of the synaptic functions in the brain. These can include, but are not limited to increased attention, memory performance, and cognitive speed. In addition to these enhanced cognitive, there are also positive and negative effects that caffeine has on the rest of the physiological systems in the body. When used in appropriate doses, caffeine has been shown to lower the risk for heart and liver disease as well as increase physical performance and muscle regeneration and recovery. However, overdependence on the use of caffeine can lead to a host of disruptions in physiology. As with all stimulants, overuse of caffeine can lead to anxiety, insomnia, jitteriness, inability to concentrate, etc. Caffeine has also been known to cause problems with the gastrointestinal track by causing the rise of peptic ulcers as a result of irritation on the lining of the intestinal and stomach wall. In relation to the anxiety and insomnia, this is caused because caffeine affects the levels of serotonin in the brain, which are responsible for establishing hunger and sleep patterns. As a result, caffeine lowers the concentration of this neurotransmitter in the brain leading to the development of unhealthy sleep patterns and insomnia. It is also possible to die from an overdose on caffeine, however this is extremely unlikely, The LD50 is around 200mg per kilogram of body weight. This means that a person would have to ingest around a hundred cups of coffee within the half-life of caffeine. There are also some psychological issues that have been associated with caffeine use. Because it is a stimulant, there are noticeable increases in cognitive performance. This is one of the reasons why the use of coffee, sodas, and energy drinks are so common in society is because the fast paced environment, especially in higher education, requires more and more time awake to focus on studies. Long-term uses, however, have shown a decrease in the hippocampus response patterns, which is responsible for helping process and integrate memory. There are also two caffeine-induced disorders called the caffeine-induced sleep disorder and the caffeine-induced anxiety disorder. In the case of the sleep disorder, a person who is a chronic user of caffeine containing compounds, such as coffee, has the ability to throw off the bodies natural sleep cycle and disrupt the circadian rhythms. As a result, the person either has the inability or an extreme problem with falling asleep. The insomnia and lack of sleep that can follow can also lead to many other physiological complications. The caffeine-induced anxiety disorder has many characteristics associated with it such as high levels of anxiety, tremors, panic attacks, and irrational behavior. This condition has been confused with many genetic defining disorders such as bipolar disorder, which often leads to many accidental psychological diagnoses (Corner, 2010). Treatment for caffeine use can be simple. In the case of the typical daily user, it requires cleansing the body of caffeine from the body and learning to function without it. This requires breaking the addiction on two parts. Psychologically, the person has fallen into the typical operant conditioning in which they have associated the use of caffeine with the relief of fatigue and an increase in energy. Thus, the positive reinforcement must be broken. Next, the person must learn to overcome the physiological component of addiction. Depending on the time the person has been using caffeine and the dosage will depend on how quickly they can be weaned from its usage. This detoxification can take however long it takes for the caffeine to be out of the person’s system. This process can be accelerated through the use of drinking fluids in order to flush the caffeine out as well as eating food to help absorb it (Rasmussen, 2000). Caffeine will probably continue to be one of the most commonly used drugs in our society. It is valued for its ability to keep us awake when we are feeling fatigue from the day. However, it is important for us to understand the inherent dangers of caffeine in that too much can result in both psychological and physiological impairment and health consequences. The old philosophy of too much of a good thing can be a bad thing can be applied to caffeine in today’s society. Works Cited Corner, R. (2010). Abnormal psychology. New York, NY: Worth Publishers. Escohotado, Antonio; Ken Symington (1999). A Brief History of Drugs: From the Stone Age to the Stoned Age. Park Street Press. ISBN 0-89281-826-3. Rasmussen, S. (2000). Addiction treatment: theory and practice. London, UK: Sage Publications. Spiegel, R, & Fatemi, S. (2003). Psychopharmacology: an introduction. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Unknown. (2011). Caffeine timeline, caffeine addiction, & caffeine effects. www.myaddiction.com. Retrieved May 10, 2011 from http://www.myaddiction.com/education/articles Yu, Lu (1995). The Classic of Tea: Origins & Rituals. Ecco Pr; Reissue edition. ISBN 0-88001- 416-4. Read More