IMuch to your dismay, you’ve been drinking four cups of coffee a day for 20 years. An energy boost, a delicious taste, a habit… who knows? But one thing you do know: your parents are big coffee drinkers. “Wait, is this a genetic thing?” It could be.
‘Look, for example, at the genetics of anxiety, or bipolar disorder and depression: in the 23andMe data set, they tend to be positively genetically correlated with the genetics of coffee drinking.’
Coffee is big business all over the world. What about you? Does it have a big role in your life?
I can take it or leave it.
Hey, before we get down to business, let’s take a look at some fun facts about coffee…
- Coffee was discovered in Ethiopia in the 14th century. Its names include qahwah (Arabic), kahve (Ottoman Turkish) and koffie (Dutch).
- Annual coffee revenue worldwide is $100 billion
- The average American coffee drinker consumes 3.1 cups a day.
- 66% of Americans drink coffee daily
- Finland leads the world in per capita coffee consumption at £26.45 per person per year.
- 42.9% of Americans say they drink coffee because they like the taste, not the energy boost.
- The main supplier of coffee to the United States is Colombia. On a global level? Brazil
Any surprises?
Introduction
In a search for recent and relevant research on mental and emotional health, I came across an interesting article that I knew I had to share.
On June 18, the “UC San Diego Today” program announced the publication of a study entitled “Is Coffee Good or Bad for You?” written by Joseph McClain, which summarizes the work carried out by an international research group. The study was published in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology.
The study leaders are Hayley HA Thorpe, PhD, Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, Western University, Ontario and Abraham Palmer, PhD, professor, UC San Diego School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry.
The team compared coffee drinking characteristics from a 23andMe database with an even larger set of records in the UK.
Let’s see what happens…
“Is coffee good or bad for you?”
We’ll start off strong with this from team member Sandra Sánchez-Roige, PhD…
“Drinking coffee is a hereditary habit that carries a certain genetic load. Caffeinated coffee is a psychoactive substance.”
You knew that, right?
The team’s mission
Explaining their mission, Dr. Thorpe began by saying that the team collected genetic data, as well as self-reported coffee consumption figures, to put together a genome-wide association study (Water quality assessment).
The idea was to establish connections between genes known to be associated with coffee consumption and traits of health-related conditions.
Dr Thorpe…
We used this data to identify regions of the genome associated with a person’s greater or lesser likelihood of drinking coffee, and then to identify the genes and biology that might underlie coffee intake.
Let’s get down to business…
Coffee consumption and genetics
DNA sequence, electrophoresis photography, restriction map
Dr Palmer said the team suspected from previous studies that there were genes that influence how much coffee a person consumes. As such, the team was not surprised to find that in both cohorts there was statistical evidence that this is an inherited trait.
Simply put, the genetic variants we inherit from our parents influence how much coffee we are likely to consume.
Palmer noted that most people are surprised to learn that there is a genetic influence on coffee consumption.
A bit like our friend from the opening paragraph.
What coffee lovers want to know
So the team tackled their first question, genetics. Now it was time for the second…
Sánchez-Roige said: “The second is something that coffee lovers are very interested in learning: is drinking coffee good or bad? Is it associated with positive health outcomes or not?”
And the answer is? It’s not definitive.
Genetic associations
Let’s cover some definitions before we continue…
TO genotype is the chemical composition of an individual’s DNA. It gives rise to a phenotypewhich are the observable traits of an individual.
TO positive genetic association is a connection between a specific genetic variant (the genotype) and a specific condition (the phenotype). In contrast, a negative genetic association It is an apparent protective quality that discourages the development of a disease.
The team’s genome-wide study of 130,153 US-based 23andMe research participants was compared to a similar UK Biobank database of 334,649 Britons.
The team found a consistent positive genetic association between coffee and adverse health outcomes such as obesity and substance use.
Emotional and mental illnesses
The results became confusing when it came to emotional and mental illnesses.
Thorpe observes…
For example, let’s look at the genetics of anxiety, or bipolar disorder and depression: in the 23andMe dataset, they tend to be positively genetically correlated with the genetics of coffee drinking. But in the UK Biobank, we see the opposite pattern, where they are negatively genetically correlated. This is not what we expected.
He went on to say that there were other instances where the 23andMe group did not align with the UK Biobank, but the biggest disagreement was in emotional and mental illness.
Explaining the differences
Some of the The differences were attributed to inaccuracies in the comparison, poor adaptation to different ways of serving coffee and the reality that many American coffee drinkers load their coffee with sugary additives.
Dr. Palmer…
Genetics influence a lot of things. For example, it influences how tall you can get. And those kinds of things would probably manifest themselves in very similar ways whether you live in the US or the UK. But coffee is a choice that people make.
Sánchez-Roige noted that coffee comes in a variety of forms, from instant to frappuccino, and is consumed amid cultural norms that differ from place to place.
A person with a particular genotype might end up having a quite different phenotype living in the UK than in the US.
Summary
Let’s bring it home with this from Dr. Sánchez-Rouge…
And that’s really what the data tells us, because unlike height, where behavior doesn’t have much to do with it, behavior and the decisions we make in our environment influence it in a variety of ways. So the interaction between genotype and environment complicates the picture.
The team stressed the need for further research to unravel the relationships between genetics and environment in other substance use problems.
Research is crucial
What do you think? I think the results of the study are interesting, beyond the correlation between genetics and coffee consumption.
Research is crucial and gives hope to those of us who suffer emotionally, mentally or physically. And I am grateful for that.
However, given my age, I am more grateful and excited about what research will bring to my children and grandchildren.
Don’t forget to check out the UC San Diego Today article: Is coffee good or bad for you?
Image of the human genome under Creative Commons license Attribution 4.0 International License. Author Ryan L. Collinsno changes were made
Coffee statistics were provided by Affection for coffee, Statesman, World Atlas, National Coffee Association
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After a decades-long battle with panic, generalized anxiety, mood swings and alcohol dependency, Bill finally found the passion of his life and work: helping those in the same situation. At age 49, he began graduate school and earned his counseling credentials. And he continues his service through Chipur and other projects.
