Coffee provides a new super power: it influences our way of perceiving time and thinking

Coffee provides a new super power, in fact, according to scientists, it would be enough to imagine this drink to influence our thinking and the perception of time. Experts have carried out several tests and explain to us how coffee acts involuntarily on our brain, modifying us. Here's what you need to know.

Coffee influences our way of perceiving time and thinking and, to get these effects, you don't need to drink it, you just have to imagine it. The news comes from researchers at the University of Toronto who analyzed the physical effects of coffee on people. Let's see together how thinking about coffee influences our behavior.

Coffee and thoughts

Coffee is a very widespread drink whose effects on our body are increasingly known, but what has not yet been clearly defined is the effect it has, if there is some effect, on our brain, therefore on a psychological level. Scientists have therefore wondered: "What happens in the brains of people who think of coffee?". Before answering this question, let us clarify some fundamental aspects of this study.

Priming and arousal

The research was based on two fundamental concepts of psychology, priming, that is the reactions that we have following exposure to a stimulus, and arousal, that is the activation of some areas of the brain which then passes to a state of alert and attention. Arousal varies according to many things, such as emotions, neurotransmitters in the brain or beverages that contain caffeine.

The study

 Now we can answer the researchers' question. The experts carried out four different studies that analyzed several participants from Eastern and Western cultures. From the tests carried out, it emerged that those who thought of coffee perceived time as being shorter and they had more concrete and precise thoughts. "People who experience arousal on a physiological level, then through priming and not drinking coffee, see the world in more specific and detailed terms," ​​the experts explain.

It is different in eastern cultures

Experts point out, however, that the same effect cannot be found in people who culturally do not drink as much coffee as we do in the West.

Not just coffee

 Not only does the thought of coffee activate our brain and our thoughts, but also with regard to fast food, for example, just looking at a sign reduces our ability to slow down and savor the pleasurable experiences of life.

The study, entitled ‘Coffee cues elevate arousal and reduce level of construal', was published in Consciousness and Cognition.