Andy’s Quick Hits (237): Caffeine Makes You More Prone to Impulsive Buying

A fascinating piece of research just published shows that drinking coffee makes you more impulsive. That means you are likely to buy more, and more items you actually don’t need.

What is astounding though, is that the effect sizes in this study was dramatic to say the least.

What did these researchers at the University of South Florida find?

They set up a complimentary coffee stand at a store and then offered shoppers complimentary coffee. But only half received caffeinated coffee with the other half receiving decaffeinated coffee. 300 of these people then shared their receipts with the researchers.

The found that those who had drank the caffeinated coffee spent 50% more on average and 30% more items. This figure is exceptionally high. Also suggesting that these individuals probably had no strict budget restraints.

The analysis also showed that those caffeinated shoppers also bought more non-essential items. However, this was not a controlled lab experiment, so the researchers also conducted a lab-based experiment whereby 200 participants then selected what they wanted to buy from a preselected list of 66 items. Again, after drinking caffeinated coffee or decaffeinated…