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Stress Plays A Large Role In A College Student’S Daily

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Stress plays a large role in a college student’s daily life with the abundance of tasks and responsibilities that they must take on. These stressors can lead to numerous risky behaviors which can affect the health of college students. Likewise, stress is one of the perils to academic performance (Pettit & DeBarr, 2011). Caffeine usage has become prevalent among college students where 98% of participants in a study by Norton, Lazev, & Sullivan (2011) consumed caffeine before. Caffeinated drinks, especially energy drinks have alarmed health professionals since there is a lack of regulation and overconsumption which can lead to major consequences such as hospitalization and possibly death (Pettit & DeBarr, 2011). Many college students consume …show more content…

The literature suggests that caffeine consumption shares a relationship with the amount of anticipated stress in undergraduate college students. (Errisuriz et al., 2016; Pettit & DeBarr, 2011; Newlon & Lovell, 2016; Simpson et al., 2016).
Pettit & DeBarr (2011) evaluated the perceived stress of 136 undergraduate students ages 18-24, with 61% of participants being female in a large southern plain university through a survey and found that participants with greater perceived stress ingested at least one energy beverage in the last 30 days and ingested greater amounts of energy drinks on average than the other participants. It was also noted that at least two-thirds (Pettit & DeBarr, 2011) and 89 % (Norton et al., 2011) of the student sample had consumed at least one energy drink in the past month. In comparison, only a minority of participants (30 %) consumed energy drinks in a study conducted by Newlon & Lovell (2016), which examined 116 community college freshmen in the Rocky Mountains through a survey. Both of these studies used the Perceived Stress Scale-14 for the determination of perceived stress. The studies were conducted on large campuses and had a higher number of female participants. Also, a majority of these studies were done with participants that would identify themselves as a non-Hispanic. Non-consumers of energy drinks tended to have lower stress levels compared to participants who were consumers

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