Energy Drink Consumption, Stress, and Academic Performance among College Students

Learning objectives for this poster presentation are as follows:

Upon participation in this session, conference attendees will be able to:

(a) Recognize potential adverse health effects attendant to energy drink consumption;

(b) Recognize the need to develop a number of alternative coping strategies for college students; and

(c) Recognize the prevalence of energy drink consumption among college students as a maladaptive coping mechanism with a demonstrated inverse relationship to academic achievement.

This study involved an exploratory assessment of relationships among energy drink consumption, perceived stress, and academic performance between male and female college students. Participants completed online surveys consisting of items from the Perceived Stress Scale (Cohen, Kamarck, & Mermelstein, 1983) and items developed by the investigators to describe energy drink consumption, academic performance, and demographics. Pearson correlation coefficients revealed positive relationships between participants' perceived stress and energy drink consumption. Correlational analyses also revealed an inverse relationship between participants' energy drink consumption and academic performance. Results from a two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) revealed that the interaction effect between gender and year in school was not statistically significant for perceived stress, F (3, 118) = 1.004, p = 0.394. However, two-way ANOVAs revealed statistically significant interactions between gender and year in school for (a) the approximate number of energy drinks consumed on days when energy drinks were consumed during the past 30 days, F (3, 118) = 3.015, p = 0.033, and (b) the largest number of energy drinks consumed on any occasion during the past 30 days, F (3, 118) = 3.416, p = 0.020. A statistically significant main effect for year in school indicated that freshmen (M = 0.330) and sophomores (M = 0.408) consumed a lower number of energy drinks yesterday than juniors (M = 1.000). Statistically significant main effects for gender were found for selected energy drink consumption items. Specifically, males reported higher means for all energy drink consumption items with statistically significant main effects for gender. Results from this study illuminate a need for education regarding potential hazards of using energy drinks in response to perceived stress. Results also highlight areas for future research involving gender and energy drink consumption.