Archive for July 13th, 2009

Caf­feine and Hal­lu­ci­na­tions … who knew

July 13th, 2009

Okay, this one is near and dear to my heart .…Caf­feine, my life’s blood may very well be linked to hal­lu­ci­na­tions accord­ing to psy­chol­o­gists at the Uni­ver­sity of Durham in England!

Recent stud­ies sug­gest that con­sum­ing too much of the sweet nec­tar we devel­op­ers know as caf­feine may increase the chances of expe­ri­enc­ing hal­lu­ci­na­tions. The psy­cho­log­i­cal effects of stress are increased by caf­feine accord­ing to Simon Jones, the lead author of the study. Peo­ple who drink lots of caf­feine drinks tend to pro­duce more cor­ti­sol in stress­ful sit­u­a­tions than peo­ple who do not drink a lot of caf­feine drinks.

Cor­ti­sol may increase the amount of neu­ro­trans­mit­ter dopamine in the brain’s lim­bic areas which may trig­ger or exag­ger­ate psy­chotic episodes accord­ing to some researchers.

So the next time you get a song stuck in your head and it keeps play­ing over and over, maybe the cure is to lay off the cof­fee for a bit!