A recent study by researchers at Ohio State University found that individuals who drink coffee before taking part in a team task will work much more constructively with their peers.
In the study participants who drank coffee before engaging in a group activity tended to rate both their own, as well as their team members', performance more positively than the individuals who were only allowed to have coffee after the task.
It was concluded this is because the increased alertness experienced from drinking coffee meant subjects saw themselves and the other group members contributing more; and that gave them a more positive attitude. The researchers observed that participants who had drunk coffee tended to talk more, but they were also more focused on their given topic of discussion and did not ramble as much as participants who had not ingested caffeine
These findings provide an interesting insight into how a group performs in a task that requires the exchange of ideas between people when the participants have caffeine in their system or not.
To 'procaffeinate' (being unable to do anything until one has had a coffee) is an increasingly fashionable phrase - this study shows the phrase may well apply to group discussions.
Read the full article from Medical News Today