Rationale: There is a growing concern over excessive caffeine use and development of caffeine use disorder in children.
Objectives: This study aimed to identify the association between caffeine intake and cognitive functioning in children.
Methods: This study included 11,718 youths aged 9-10 years with cognitive and caffeine intake information that were extracted from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. The ABCD study is a longitudinal cohort study started in 2017 that aims to understand the relationships between substance use and neurocognition in youths living in the USA. Cognitive measures were obtained through the 7 core cognitive instruments from the NIH toolbox (vocabulary comprehension, reading decoding, inhibitory control, working memory, cognitive flexibility, processing speed, and episodic memory). Associations between caffeine intake and the seven cognitive functions were examined using multiple regression models.
Results: Our study revealed that caffeine intake negatively correlated with all the seven cognitive measures. After adjustment for age, gender, sleep, and socioeconomic status (SES), caffeine intake was still found to be negatively associated with most of the cognitive functions, such as vocabulary comprehension, working memory, cognitive flexibility, processing speed, and episodic memory, except reading decoding, and inhibitory control.
Conclusions: As beverages with caffeine are consumed frequently, controlling their intake may reduce a risk for nonoptimal cognitive development in children.
Keywords: Caffeine; Children; Cognition; Executive function.