Drinking 2-3 cups of coffee a day tied to lower dementia risk — Harvard Gazette
news.harvard.edu
Caffeinated tea also found to slow cognitive decline in study.
  • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.worldEnglish
    71·
    4 天前

    How about 15?

    Also, I wonder if they controlled for people who do specific kinds of work where coffee explicitly helps in the labor.

        • partofthevoice@lemmy.zipEnglish
          7·
          4 天前

          I discovered a hack deal by just pouring extra shots of espresso into the coffee. One cup, 10 shots, one gram of caffeine. Expect the barista to glare with concern, it’s part of the deal.

          • Berengaria_of_Navarre@lemmy.worldEnglish
            12·
            4 天前

            I did once have two quad espressi while waiting for a flight at stupid o’clock in the morning at Stansted airport. The guys in Costa coffee mostly just found it amusing.

            I was also once approached by an alcoholic who chastised me for drinking coffee in a bar in the middle of the day instead of “a real drink”. I offered to take a shot of vodka for each espresso he drank and “we would see who dies first”. He didn’t take me up on my offer.

      • agingelderly@lemmy.worldEnglish
        12·
        4 天前

        Yeah that doesn’t make sense. More like if the people drinking 3-4 cups a day are doing mental work vs physical work

        • MyTurtleSwimsUpsideDown@fedia.io
          9·
          4 天前

          Im not convinced that picking Amazon packages, operating heavy machinery, doing data entry, or copy editing would have vastly differing performance changes from coffee consumption.

          However…

          I would imagine that an office worker might have more ready access to coffee, such as a communal coffee maker, than someone with less sedentary workspace.

          • Ugandan Airways@lemmy.zipEnglish
            2·
            4 天前

            Read in a book about coffee that without coffee the Industrial Revolution wouldn’t have happened. Coffee fuels capitalism by making people work.

        • Berengaria_of_Navarre@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          4 天前

          I think the person is more of a deciding factor than the work. I drink a minimum of 6 a day and don’t notice much, but my partner can’t drink a sip of coffee without projectile vomiting and can only manage a can of monster over the course of a full day.

          • how_we_burned@lemmy.zipEnglish
            5·
            4 天前

            but my partner can’t drink a sip of coffee without projectile vomiting

            Well tell them to stop mixing their Ayahuasca in with their morning coffee.

            I used to but boy teams meetings used to be really hard with you were going into another realm

          • P00ptart@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            4 天前

            Coffee does fuck all to me, I don’t know if it’s the ADHD or years of drinking too much pop or something.

            • Berengaria_of_Navarre@lemmy.worldEnglish
              2·
              4 天前

              It’s a psychosomatic reaction due to an experience they had as a toddler. They also really hate the taste and smell of it generally. So they aren’t really missing out.

              • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
                2·
                3 天前

                Finally, someone consistent. It’s so weird that so many people love the smell of coffee despite hating the taste. I don’t get it but I’m on team “coffee love” but can respect someone who puts their all into not loving it

      • WesternInfidels@feddit.onlineEnglish
        4·
        4 天前

        I believe surgeons, dentists, and people who do similar small-scale hands-on work, like precision soldering, avoid coffee, because it makes for shaky (but alert!) hands. There are likely enough others that I’m not thinking of.

        • homes@piefed.worldEnglish
          2·
          4 天前

          I see plenty of this every day. Medical heroism doesn’t count. That’s just part of your Starfleet duty.

    • moakley@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      4 天前

      I read about a study years ago that said yes, the benefit keeps going up the more caffeine you consume. Not sure I could find it again though.

  • TrackinDaKraken@lemmy.worldEnglish
    29·
    4 天前

    In this case, it appears to be the caffeine. Also, with these sorts of large studies, the amount is self-reported, so “a cup” is whatever the person reporting considers to be a cup, it’s not some controlled amount.

    Key Points

    Question: Is long-term intake of caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee associated with risk of dementia and cognitive outcomes?

    Findings: In this prospective cohort study of 131 821 individuals from 2 cohorts with up to 43 years of follow-up, 11 033 dementia cases were documented. Higher caffeinated coffee intake was significantly associated with lower risk of dementia. Decaffeinated coffee intake was not significantly associated with dementia risk.

    Meaning: Higher caffeinated coffee intake was associated with more favorable cognitive outcomes.

    • Fmstrat@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      2 天前

      Yea, “associated” does the work here. More research is needed into daily mental activities. It could simply be that those requiring more caffeine are also more stimulated day to day.

  • U7826391786239@lemmy.zipEnglish
    19·
    4 天前

    how are they defining “cup”? 16 oz? 8? some coffee roasters advise using 6oz “cups” as a measurement, some say 8

  • venusaur@lemmy.worldEnglish
    15·
    4 天前

    Causation vs correlation. I’m thinking caffeine keeps your brain stimulated which lowers risk of dementia. You can probably equally keep your brain stimulated other ways especially if you already have an active lifestyle.

    • FreeBeard@slrpnk.netEnglish
      5·
      4 天前

      Iirc the causality is thought to be about opening vesicles and increasing blood flow in the brain.

        • FreeBeard@slrpnk.netEnglish
          1·
          3 天前

          Complex question. Many things increase blood flow like physical exercise or even alcohol. While being active for sure is healthy, alcohol combines the positive and the negative so the effect will not be measurable.

          Apart from that: caffeine is the only controversial thing in coffee (other studies report different results). Decaf is healthy without doubt. For old people caffeine has no effect on sleeping so we could recommend it for brain health. If you can still feel an effect on your sleep, do what feels best for you.

    • explodicle@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      2·
      4 天前

      My guess is that people who regularly drink coffee are supporting some sort of regular mental activity, like a job or school.

    • XeroxCool@lemmy.worldEnglish
      31·
      4 天前

      It’s fine to highlight it’s correlation, but your guess is a theory of causation. It’s likely either some genetic combo that drives the desire for coffee or some lifestyle arrangement that drives the need.

      Even the idea that an inactive mind leads to deterioration isn’t definitively causation. Correlation goes both ways. Are they mentally healthy because they’re mentally active? Or are they mentally active because they’re mentally healthy? The degree of mental deterioration goes up as you age, which is also when you can retire, when you don’t have to support your family, when you’re physically incapacitated, and when you slow down overall. So yeah, I plan to stay active because I’ll take my chances that it helps, but at some point, something will simply break. Maybe I’ll inherit the dimentia. Maybe I’ll inherit the neuropathy. Maybe both. Maybe neither.

    • ameancow@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      3 天前

      We can start a scam like carbon-credits, and sell off our extra coffee usage to others who don’t drink as much!

  • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    3 天前

    Remember the definition of dementia is a bit counter-intuitive. It’s “not important” what sort of neural degradation you are dealing with, the diagnosis is defined by how much it affects you. A lot of the things that “reduce” dementia are actually things that help you work around the damage so the impact in your life is reduced.

    • qjkxbmwvz@startrek.websiteEnglish
      8·
      4 天前

      Given that they specified “caffeinated tea” as also conferring benefit, I would guess it’s the caffeine that’s the active substance here.

    • TrackinDaKraken@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      4 天前

      The most pronounced associated differences were observed with intake of approximately 2 to 3 cups per day of caffeinated coffee or 1 to 2 cups per day of tea.

  • GreenKnight23@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    3 天前

    I drink coffee because I’m tired because I didn’t sleep enough.

    caffeinated coffee lowers risk. not sleeping increases risk.

    does that mean that I can replace sleep with caffeine?

  • Kairos@lemmy.todayEnglish
    51·
    4 天前

    Correlation does not equal causation

    Edit: although half the rate is very interesting