Posted by 3 Beer Effect on May 14, 2002, at 0:03:49
In reply to Vivarin Experience **3 beers***, posted by geno on May 12, 2002, at 20:28:20
Geno, although you can only buy Caffeine pills in 200 mg form (Vivarin & No-Doz), 200 mg is too high for most people.
It is said the normally effective dose for mental stimulation is 100 mg every 3 to 4 hours as needed with a MAX of 255 mg OR three cups of coffee per day. The half life of caffeine is about 3.5 hours. At the dose of 100 mg you get a maximum amount of mental stimulation without too much peripheral (nervous) stimulation. Caffeine in pill is probably better because in pill form it only causes half as much gastric secretion as coffee or cola, but be sure to drink lots of gatorade or water with it to avoid dehydration/nausea. Food will slightly cut down the rate but not the extent of caffeine absorption & will quickly rid the stomach of caffeine-related nausea & take some of the nervous edge off of it.
Higher doses of caffeine cause nervousness & respiratory stimulation which are all bad things especially if you have social phobia. Caffeine is definitely an anxiogenic & is not recommended at all for social phobics but I find in smaller doses like 100 mg it is okay, & seems to lift the spirits.
The absolute maximum but also the perfect mentally stimulating dose of caffeine for a given person is 2 mg/kg. I think a kg is about 2.2 pounds (atleast that is what my coke dealer told me, just kidding!). At any dose between 85 mg & the max of 2 mg/kg, Caffeine releases dopamine into the prefrontal cortex & releases norepinephrine & epinephrine in the brain in addition to stimulating the neurons in your brain to fire more rapidly.
So caffeine is definitely a psychostimulant, atleast at low doses. At higher doses (250 + mgs or 3 cups of coffee or more) it overstimulates leading to increased mental errors (of commission). Caffeine stimulation is better for routine, boring, repetitive, or simple tasks such as typing/data entry. Complex tasks require a lower level of arousal. It has little effect on memory but increases alertness, reaction time, & your ability to quickly process incoming information.
If you ingest more than three cups of coffee or about 255 mg of caffeine per day, the vasoconstriction properties of caffeine become quite strong & make the blood brain barrier harder to cross for medications or even nutrients/vitamins. At this level Caffeine is no longer a psychostimulant, but makes you dumber. It is probably a bad idea for anyone to drink more than three cups of coffee per day unless they have some kind of migraine disorder.
Caffeine doesn't have the euphoric/feel good properties of amphetamines or ritalin because it doesn't release dopamine into the nucleus accumbens, the reward center of the brain. Caffeine also reduces blood flow to the brain while Amphetamines & Ritalin increase it. To a point, the more caffeine you take the worse you feel, while the more amphetamines you take the better you feel. For more info on how caffeine differs from the amphetamines see this link:
http://biopsychiatry.com/caffeine.htmOne last note, I think people underestimate how addictive Caffeine really is. I bet most people could not go a month without caffeine. Personally, I think Nicotine & Crack Cocaine are the only substances more addictive than Caffeine. I no longer drink caffeine but had 10 times as much difficulty quitting caffeine as I did stopping (snorting) powder cocaine which was relatively easy to quit. Dexedrine or Adderall doesn't seem to be addictive at all to me, although they can be for some.
3 Beers
poster:3 Beer Effect
thread:106146
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020510/msgs/106271.html