There is an old Ethiopian proverb that says coffee, like love, is best served hot. With the Syracuse winter already upon us in November, many students are already reaching for their mugs.

Coffee, as much as sleeping and eating, has become a necessary part of some people’s daily routine. They use the caffeine the drink contains to get them started in the morning, and drink cup after cup to keep their energy up.

Many, like Kendra-Lee Rosati, a junior public relations major, feel the coffee-maker in their room is a necessity to get through the day.

‘I drink at least four cups a day on a good day,’ Rosati said. ‘On a bad day, it’s more like four pots of coffee.’

Rosati thinks that, due to her amount of coffee intake, she might be an addict, but professor Tibor Palfai, professor of the class PSY 315: Drugs and Human Behavior, says the idea of a caffeine addiction is a myth. The definition of addiction refers to behavior; it’s something a person focuses all his or her time and energy on. No one searches for caffeine all night and day, because there is a limit to how much someone can use with comfort. If people drink too much coffee, they get too jittery – and it’s not a good feeling, said Palfai.

Caffeine, though, happens to be the most used drug in the world due to its social acceptability and the many food products which contain it. Coffee contains anywhere from 50 to 100 milligrams of caffeine per serving – depending on if it’s instant or brewed – which makes it just a mild stimulant. Even so, caffeine is a drug all the same. People who rely on it, Palfai said, can become accustomed to its effects and need an increased dose, and, if taken in excess, can even die from it – granted, this would require drinking about 60 cups of coffee at once.

The effects of caffeine last about three to four hours, which is why the usual morning coffee drinker will be craving another dose by mid-afternoon and then again in the evening, Palfai said. Yet people who think caffeine will make them smarter when doing work are mistaken, Palfai said, because the drug does nothing but increase alertness. This is why so many people start their day off with coffee, and can’t really function until they have their first cup, said Natalie Lurowist, a worker at People’s Place and a sophomore musical theater major.

‘Some people will come in and just hand you a mug and won’t even say what they want in the morning,’ Lurowist said. ‘So you have to kind of pry information out of them.’

Coffee also has a great social aspect behind it. People enjoy sitting with a friend and a cup of coffee and just chatting, said Jennifer Jesse, store manager for the Starbucks on Marshall Street. Coffeehouses are a convenient place for people to sit back and relax, especially for students who might need a moment or two to stop and collect their thoughts. Jesse estimates about 75 percent of the customers in the M-Street Starbucks are college students who require a cup of coffee to help them get through their day.

‘Coffee is surrounded with rituals, surrounded with cultures, surrounded with friendships, surrounded with coffeehouses where you get access to good conversation,’ Palfai said. ‘It has an entire atmosphere that will support its use.’

Coffee is just a necessity to some people, and sometimes it’s nice to have a hot beverage on a cold day or a cold beverage on a hot day, said Heather Widell, a freshman sports management major who said she drinks one cup of coffee a day – and only from Starbucks because she said she likes the different flavors and choices and dislikes Dunkin’ Donuts. Widell said she enjoys coffee because it’s something that tastes good and helps her focus throughout the day.

‘A lot of students look for that thing to keep them up and help them do their work,’ said Jeffrey Kaczmarczyk, a junior resident adviser and a rhetorical studies major. ‘They’re like ‘Oh, I’m so tired and I’m busy and I need to stay awake to do this work,’ or ‘I want to stay awake to get this project done and I don’t want to take a nap and all that.’ So I think they resort to coffee as something they can easily get that will help them do whatever they have to do.’

More than 90 million cups of coffee are consumed each day around the world, according to drugscope.org, and, like all drugs, caffeine does have its negative side effects on the human body. It increases heart rate and blood pressure along with causing headaches and feelings of irritability as the drug starts to wear off. There have even been reports suggesting that long-term use of caffeine can lead to a higher incidence of asthma, peptic ulcers, kidney, bladder and heart disease and blood pressure problems.

Yet, as long as coffee is drunk in moderation – no more than three to four cups a day – it is a perfectly healthy and acceptable stimulant for students to use to help them focus on their daily routines

‘Don’t drink too many (cups) or you won’t be able to sleep,’ Palfai said. ‘A couple cups of coffee is good enough.’

Published on November 8, 2004 at 12:00 pm