KEDAH MATRICULATION COLLEGE

COFFEE CONSUMPTION AND KEDAH

MATRICULATION STUDENTS STUDY HABIT
To be submitted to:
Puan Normila Ishak
Group members:
GAJENDRAN RAO A/L MURAGAN

MS1318530050

NUR AINAA NABILA BT. OTHMAN

MS1318531825

JASVEERPAL SINGH

MS1318530318

HASHVEENA A/P VEERAKUMAR

MS1318529991

K3S1P3
22 FEBRUARY 2014

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisor, Puan Normila

Ishak for the continuous support and guidance to complete this report. Her guidance helped us in
all the time of research and writing of this report.
Besides my advisor, I would like to thank the rest of my group members for their
encouragement, insightful comments and their support for the financial needs to complete this
report.
I would also like to thank the students of Kedah Matriculation College for cooperating
with us to fill up the questionnaire that we had distributed.
Last but not least, I would thank our fellow friends for the information they had shared
with us. Not forgetting the support they had given us.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION .............................................................................5
1.1 Background .............................................................................................................5
1.2.Definition of Terms..6
1.3 Statement of The Problems..6
1.4 Importance of The Research7
1.5 Citations...8
1.6 Research Questions..9
1.7 Objective of The Research9
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY. .......................................................................10
2.1 The Research Design ...............................................................................................10
2.2 Sampling ..................................................................................................................10
2.3 Research Setting ......................................................................................................11
2.4 Data Gathering..........11
2.5 Instrument Use..11
CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION........................................................12
CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSIONS ...................................................................................20
4.1 Summary .................................................................................................................20
4.2 Recommendations/Suggestions ...............................................................................21
REFERENCES/BIBLIOGRAPHY ...............................................................................22
APPENDIX: Questionnaire for the Participants of the Survey.....................................23-24

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Figure 1: The Number of Students that Drink Coffee14
Figure 2: The Number of Students That Drink Coffee While Study..15
Figure 3: Coffee Consumption of Students per Day...16
Figure 4: When Do Students Consume Coffee ..17
Figure 5: Consumptions Other than Coffee18
Figure 6: Agreement of Coffee Consumption Affecting Study..19

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CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND
Studying for an exam can be one of the most stressful events in a student`s life. There are
students who are always nervous and anxious and others find ways to deal with the burden. How
do these students cope with their stress? Some will exercise, and others procrastinate. When
students find that stress and anxiety are overwhelming, they often seek alternate solutions. One
of the solutions includes consuming a stimulant called coffee. Coffee relaxes the brain and they
feel more attentive which allow them to study late night.
Coffee generally refers to a beverage made by the infusion, decoction or percolation of
the roasted, ground seeds of the coffee plant* (genus Coffea, and usually C. arabica or C.
canephora / C. robusta). Coffee is prized for its aroma and flavor, and is noted for the fact that it
naturally contains varying levels of caffeine. In coffee cupping, traits of coffee like acidity and
mouth feel are also noted. Coffee elevates neural activity in many parts of the brain, postpones
fatigue, and enhances performance at simple intellectual tasks and at physical work that involves
endurance but not fine motor coordination. Coffee also has its negative side effects. Too much
coffee can cause over-stimulation to the body and brain. It can cause restlessness, anxiety,
difficulty in sleeping, irregular heartbeat and excess amount of acids in the stomach, which can
lead to abdominal pain and nausea.

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1.2 DEFINITION OF TERMS

Factors- these refers to anything that affects study habits

Study Habits- refers to the ways of studying on a particular subject
Kedah Matriculation College Students- referring to all officially enrolled students of Kedah
Matriculation College.
Coffee a hot drink made from the roasted and ground bean-like seeds of a tropical shrub.

1.3 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Student nowadays are always busy on their study and often having lack of sleep. They
often consume coffee so that they can stay awake till late night. Drinking coffee can have a
major implication on students academic performance. College student can be proven one of the
most targeted groups by this type of drinking. However due to the rate of production is so rapid,
many students are not aware of the implications of consumption of caffeine.

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1.4 IMPORTANCE OF THE RESEARCH

Regardless of all the information in research studies, there seem to be a little information on
the relationship between coffee consumption and college students` study habits. We speculated
that students usually consume more coffee when they are preparing and studying for an exam. As
stated earlier, drinking too much coffee is not a positive study habit; therefore, in our study, we
attempt to focus on this area.
We hypothesized that students who consumed more coffee while studying would exhibit
negative and unhealthy study habits, especially when studying for complicated word problems or
tasks. We looked at demographic variables such as age, gender, class, and major to determine
whether they had any effect on students` coffee consumption and study habits. We wanted to
determine whether caffeine consumption leads students to healthy or unhealthy study habits.
Unhealthy study habits include procrastination, minimal studying time, increased anxiety, and
low levels of information retained by the student.
This study is conducted to open up the eyes of the students about the benefit and harmful
effects of coffee. How coffee is correlated with the anxiety level and to correct their
misconception about the coffee consumption.

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1.5 CITATIONS

Coffee comes from a shrub-like tree that grows in almost any soil and prefers the climate
between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. The coffee tree bears flowers, ripe fruit, and
unripe fruit at the same time. For many, coffee is first and foremost the favored source of
caffeine. Two seeds or beans are found within the fruit of the coffee tree. The first step after
harvesting is to remove these beans from the fruit. This is done in one of two ways; by dry
processing or by wet processing. Wet processing is much more expensive although it is not true
that dry processing always leads to an inferior product.
Coffee has been associated with occupational stress and anxiety about grade point average
and is known to abrupt sleep quality and cause sleep disturbance. (Gurley, 1984). Coffee
ingestion affects sleep and there is a high posibility of daytime sleepiness. Sleeping difficulties
resulted in irritability and affected lifestyle and interpersonal relationships.( Department of
Physiology, Shifa College of Medicine. Jan - Jun 2004)
Smoking and caffeine consumption are performance degraders. They should be avoided
as much as possible. Caffeine is known to cause sleeplessness which in turn leads to fatigue and
a tired brain cannot perform to its peak level when required.(PR Log (Press Release) Feb 11,
2010).
Caffeine injects adrenaline into your system, giving you a temporary boost, but possibly
making you fatigued and depressed later. If you take more caffeine to counteract these effects,

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you end up spending the day in an agitated state, and might find yourself jumpy and edgy by
night. (Elizabeth Scott., 2008)

1.6 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

More evidences are needed regarding the coffee consumption habits. This is a gap which
is aimed to get a better understanding on how coffee consumption is related to the study habits
among students. It also aimed to answer the following questions:
1) How much students consume coffee while study?
2) What is the effect of coffee on exam preparation?
3) What are the different views of students about coffee consumption?

1.7 OBJECTIVE OF RESEARCH

The purpose of the study is to assess the relationship between coffee consumption and the
study habits in Kedah Matriculation College. It is to find whether students risk awareness for
consuming coffee had effected their study habits, and to determine the effect on their academic
performance.

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CHAPTER 2
METHODOLOGY
2.1 THE RESEARCH DESIGN
This was correlation study to determine, describe and analyze relationships between coffee
consumption and the dependent variable which is the study habit. This study is to find out the
relationship between these two variables. One variable was students coffee consumption and
this was measured in cups of coffee those students consume while studying. Another variable
was on study habits measured in either healthy or unhealthy. Criteria for healthy studying habit
in this study was preparing for exam at least 1 week before the exams for at least 2-4 hours and
not waiting until the night before or the day of exam to study. To measure this, a question was
mentioned in questionnaire asking the students Do you drink more coffee to study for the test?
and Does coffee helps you to concentrate during your study session?

2.2 SAMPLING
We selected a sample size of about 50 students in the area within Kedah Matriculation College
specifically the One Year Programme students. Out of which 25 female and 25 male students
are chosen through Convenient Sampling technique through questionnaires.

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( Convenient sampling means to collect information from members of population who are
conveniently available to provide it)

2.3 RESEARCH SETTINGS

The study was conducted within the One Year Programme students in Kedah Matriculation
College. A total of 50 questionnaires were then distributed to the students mentioned earlier, in
their respective classrooms, with an explanation of the aims and objectives of the study.

2.4 DATA GATHERING

The students were asked to participate voluntarily. The purpose of the research was explained to
the participants. For the data collection we chose the time of break from 1:00pm to 2:00pm.
Every participant had completed the questionnaire within 5 to 10 minutes.

2.5 INSTRUMENT USE

Self- developed questionnaire composed of 10 itemed questions will be used to measure the
study habits and frequency of coffee consumption during the study sessions. The data were
collected on 8 February 2014. It was a close end questionnaire.

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CHAPTER 3
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS
We as group have collected all our data mainly from handing out questionnaires to Kedah
Matriculation Collegue students. Our target group were One Year Programme Science stream
students mainly due to the factor of convienience to hand out our questionnaires.
Our questionnaire only consist of one section which ten different question in it.Our topic and
main idea was to find out how consumption of coffee affects the students ability to study for
more longer hours or afficiently.We also wanted to know more about when and what time do
they usually consume their cup of hot coffee.
Firstly,we started our questionnaires by finding out the students personal details such
gender,race,which module they are,and many more.Next,we ask them whether do they consume
coffee at a regular basis or just once a blue moon.Later we started getting into the details by
asking questions such as how many cups do they drink,when do they consume it,what time they
consume it and also whether their coffee consumption increase during exam period.

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Lastly we finish off our questionnaires by asking their personal opinion about coffee and also
do they consume other liquids in order to help them to concentrate better or even helpin g them
in burning the midnight oil

We believe that the students, particularly the students from Kedah Matriculation College,
will benefit from the findings of this study since the study provides a basis for awareness and a
better understanding on how high level of coffee consumption would result in an unhealthy study
habit. Likewise gives them a more focused and clear understanding about the positive and
negative side effects of coffee consumption. Consequently, this awareness also gives a much
deeper understanding of themselves as students.
Future Researchers, they may be able to use the result of the study in farther research similar to
what the study is.

The hypotheses are stated below:

i) The high level of coffee intake has no significant relationship with students unhealthy study
habits.
ii) Most of the Kedah Matriculation students consume coffee while studying.
iii) Coffee can enhance the concentration of students on their studies.

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iv) Students at Kedah Matriculation College often study until midnight when preparing a test
with consumption of coffee.

After the data has collected and analyze,it is proved that the data has answered our research.

20
19
18
17
16
15
14
13
12
11
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0

The
of Students
that Drinkthat
Coffee
Figure
1:Number
The Number
of Students
Drink
Coffee

Yes
No

Male

Female

17 out of 25 males that were involved in this research said that they consume coffee. While for
the females,16 out of 25 said that they drink coffee. There was a small difference between the
number of males and female that consume coffee. After the data was analyzed and the
percentages were calculated, over 66% of the students drink coffee. Among the students who

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drink coffee, there are 51.52% and 48.48% of male students and female students respectively
that consume coffee.
Figure 2: The Number of Students That Drink Coffee While
Study
2
No
9

Female
Male
14
Yes
8

10

12

14

16

There were over 66.67% of students who drinks coffee while studying which consist of 36.36%
of male students and 63.64% of female students among them.The graph shows that 18.18 % of
female students do not drink coffee while studying whereas 81.81% for male students. From the
data obtained, we found out that more females students drink coffee while studying compared to
males.

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Figure 3: Coffee Consumption of Students per Day

18

17

16
14

12

12

1 Cup

10

2 Cups
More than 2 Cups

8
6

4
2
0

0
Male

0
Female

Among the students who consumes coffee, over 100% of male students drink 1 cup of coffee
per day.Furthermore approximately 75% of the female students drink only 1 cup of coffee per
day.While on the other hand, 25% of females students drink 2 cups of coffee per
day.Suprisingly,there were no students who overdose their coffee consumption by drinking more
than 2 cups of coffee per day.Based on the statistic found,it clearly shows female students do
consume more coffee than males and this may explan to the reason why female students usually
have a better academic record rhan males students.

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Figure 4: When do students consume coffee

3

Before Study

13

During Study

After Study

Female

Male

0
2

10

12

14

Among the students who drink coffee, over 30.30% of students drink coffee before studying,
which consist of 30% of female students and 70% of male students among them.Moreover,there
were 63.64% students who drink coffee during their studying time which consist of 61.90% of
female students and 38.10% of male students among them. Over 6.06% of students,which were
the smallest percentage,do drink coffee after their studying time which is only done by male
students.

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Figure 5: Consumptions Other than Coffee

12%

12%
6%

Milo
10%

Ice Lemon Tea

Nestum
Soft Drinks
Fruit Juices

32%

Hot Chocolate
Soya Bean
10%

18%

There were 34% of the students who do not drink coffee and consume other form of
liquids.Among them 12% of them consume Milo,32% hot chocolate, 18% fruit juices, 10% soft
drinks, 10% Nestum, 6% ice lemon tea,and 12% soya bean.

14%

Figure 6: Agreement of Coffee Consumption Affecting Study

32%

Agree by Male Students

Disagree by Male
Students
Agree by Female Students
36%

-118%

Disagree by Female
Students

Among the students in Kedah Matriculation College, over 32% of students thinks that coffee
affects their study habits.They were 43.75% of male students and 56.25% of female students
among them.

From our six graphs we can conclude that female students do drinks more coffee regularly
compare to male students.Furthermore,most among them who consume coffee only take coffee
while they are studying.If they do not consume coffee most of them just have a cup of hot
chocholate.

CHAPTER 4
CONCLUSION
4.1 SUMMARY
We found out that our main hypothesis which is most of the students consume coffee
during their study session was proven to be true. There are 66.67% of students who consume
coffee while study among the students who consume coffee. Among the students who consume
coffee while study, there are 36.36% of male students and 63.64% of female students. This
indicates that the number of female students who consume coffee while study are more than the
male students. Female students are more dependent on coffee to help them concentrate better
during their study session. They study till late night, and they consume coffee to stay awake
longer and concentrate more on their studies. 32% of students think that coffee affects their

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study. This shows that they are depending on coffee while studying. Most of the students drink
coffee during their study. This is to enable them to concentrate during their study sessions.
According to the research, students who consume coffee while studying have both
unhealthy and healthy study habits. This is based on how the students consume coffee, it may be
beneficial or harmful.

4.2 RECOMMENDATIONS/SUGGESTIONS
There are some suggestions for future studies on study habits and coffee consumption, and they
include:
1) Finding participants who are willing to participate on a volunteer basis because they
are the ones who will find this topic interesting and would give full cooperation.
2) Conduct this study in different colleges to get more deep and accurate findings.
3) Create a more valid and reliable survey to answer questions that were addressed in
this study.
4) Do not limit your study only for one department or group, as this study chose only
Kedah Matriculation College students.

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REFFERENCES

1. Diane Todd (May 06, 2010).How caffeine affects test taking in college students
2.

The relationship between caffeine consumption and study habits.

http://www.mancol.edu/stntlife/ccenter/articles/addicti/caff.html.October 17,2000

3.

Umar A. Khan, Sara N. Pasha, Sarah K. Khokhar, Asim A. Rizvi.Sleep habits and
their consequence.

3.

Prof. Madya Shariza Abd. Razak,Pensyarah Program Dietik,Pusat Pengajian Sains

Kesihatan,Universiti Sains Malaysia.The effects of coffee.

5.

How to improve study habits during exams?.http://www.studyskillswebinar.com

6.

Research the relationship between caffeine consumption and the study habits and

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grades in college students. University of Kentucky

7. Elizabeth Scott. Low-stress study tips for finals season.
8. PR Log (Press Release) Feb 11, 2010
9. Department of Physiology,Shifa College of Medicine. Jan - Jun 2004

APPENDIX
QUESTIONNAIRE

COFFEE CONSUMPTION AND KMK STUDENTS STUDY HABIT

PART A
GENDER : MALE

FEMALE

RACE :

MALAY

INDIAN

OTHERS

CHINESE

MODULE 1

MODULE 3

PST :

MODULE 2

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)
(

PART B
Purpose: To study the relationship between coffee consumption and KMK students study
habits.
Direction: Please put tick () on the point that corresponds to what you are actually doing, thinking,
and feeling regarding the statement. There are no right and wrong answers to this questionnaire. Rest
assured that your answers will be treated in strictest and will be used only for this study.
1. Do you drink coffee?
Yes

), if yes please proceed to question 2.

No

), if no please proceed to question 8.

2. Do you drink coffee while you study?

Yes

No

3. How often do you drink coffee per day?

1 cup

2 cups

More than 2 cups

4. When do you drink coffee?

Before study

During study

After study

5. How many cups of coffee do you consume per study session?

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1 cup

2 cups

More than 2 cups

6. Do you drink more coffee to study for a test?

Yes

No

7. Does coffee help you to concentrate in you study session?

Yes
No

(
(

8. Do you take other consumption besides coffee?

Yes

), if yes please state : _______________________________

No

9. Do you feel asleep during your study session without coffee?

Yes
No

(
(

10. Do you think coffee will affect your study?

Yes

No

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