Does coffee stunt a person's growth

September 28, 2011 2:16 AM

Does coffee stunt your growth.

I'm having trouble shifting through all the varying opinions on the internet for the answer. I'm 20 years old but I'm quite short so I'm curious if coffee stunts a persons growth.

posted by philllip to Health & Fitness (24 answers total)

How long have you been drinking coffee? And how much do you drink each day? I mean, unless you were drinking tons of it from the time you were a child I doubt it could have that much effect.
posted by IndigoRain at 2:35 AM on September 28, 2011

Wow, maybe it does (in 1-2 year old children who consume more than 100 ml per day of coffee).
posted by themel at 2:49 AM on September 28, 2011

Cecil Adams of the Straight Dope researched this question in 2004 and found no evidence that it did.

Now, he uncharacteristically waffles by also saying he found no evidence that it didn't. But personally I'd still interpret the overall answer to your question as a no — in science, the burden is on the claimant to support their claim.
posted by davemessina at 2:57 AM on September 28, 2011

Are you asking if your mother drank coffee during her pregnancy with you?

Anecdotal evidence, but I have a 5'11" female friend who I know has been drinking coffee since the 8th grade (13 yo) as I rode the bus with her everyday and her thermos of coffee.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 3:05 AM on September 28, 2011 [1 favorite]

If coffee had any major part to play in human growth we'd likely know by now. If there is any effect it's probably slight and only noticeable in extreme cases of caffeine use in pregnancy and early childhood. Your adult height is mostly determined by a mixture of genetics and childhood nutrition.

There are plenty of better reasons not to give kids caffeine though.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 3:34 AM on September 28, 2011 [2 favorites]

My little brother is just a skosh under 6'4". He had coffee occasionally growing up because he liked it (maybe a half a mug on the weekends?) and more often as he got older. He also snacked constantly on Coke and Goldfish Crackers and only poked at his dinner. We come from a pretty tall family.

My boyfriend is 5'4" and didn't really start drinking coffee until he was an adult. He's been a voracious eater (of healthy food) his whole life. He comes from a pretty short family.

I think it's very unlikely that you're short because you drink coffee. Are you unusually short for your family? Or are you just quite short next to giganto-monsters like my brother?
posted by phunniemee at 3:52 AM on September 28, 2011

Best answer: According to Never Shower in a Thunderstorm: Surprising Facts and Misleading Myths About Our Health and the World We Live In (2007):

Can Drinking Coffee Stunt A Child's Growth?

...after decades of research on the physiological results of coffee consumption, scientists have yet to find any evidence that consuming coffee has an effect on your height.

posted by XMLicious at 3:54 AM on September 28, 2011

Kids tend not to drink a lot of coffee, but plenty of kids get plenty of caffeine through soda. I think we'd know if caffeine stunted growth.
posted by rikschell at 4:58 AM on September 28, 2011

I drank a ton of coffee starting at age 11 or 12, and I mean I was drinking 2-3 cups a day in junior high school, ramping up to 5 or 6 by the time I was 16 or so, and more than that through my late teens and early 20s.

I'm a brawny 6 footer, an inch taller than my dad. So are my brothers, all of whom were coffee freaks.

So anecdotally, I can confirm what the literature seems to show: no.
posted by spitbull at 5:06 AM on September 28, 2011

I drink more coffee than any three people I know, and have done so since age 12 or so. I am 6'5". Your mileage may vary.
posted by Mayor West at 5:27 AM on September 28, 2011

I drank it from the age of four and am only five feet tall. Fwiw.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 5:48 AM on September 28, 2011 [1 favorite]

Personal data point: I started drinking coffee at 18 when I started college. I grew 2 inches between then and when I graduated. But I was 6'2" already, so perhaps coffee couldn't overcome genetics at that point.
posted by tommasz at 5:57 AM on September 28, 2011

I don't think drinking coffee stunts growth any more than wearing a hat causes baldness.
posted by smitt at 6:52 AM on September 28, 2011

It's kind of an old wives' tale with a touch of parental conspiracy, derived from the idea that caffeine can affect bone mass. Its main function is to shut down the "whyyyyy" of a stubborn child wanting to drink coffee like a grownup.

I never heard that caffeine will stunt your growth, just coffee specifically. But when I was a kid in the 70s/early 80s, it was typical to only occasionally allow kids to drink soda.
posted by desuetude at 7:07 AM on September 28, 2011 [3 favorites]

I've been drinking coffee daily since I was 12 and I developed fine (6 foot). I think the whole notion of it stunting ones growth is an old wives tale.
posted by handbanana at 8:01 AM on September 28, 2011

6'5", been drinking coffee daily since I was, like, 12.
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:32 AM on September 28, 2011

I've been drinking coffee since I was four or five, and I'm about 5'8", fairly average. I also have a friend who had been drinking coffee since he was a child, and he's 6'8". A coworker started drinking coffee in elementary school and he's 6'4".

I also have a friend who has never touched a drop and she's 4'6" as an adult.

I think this is one of those times when "Correlation does not imply causation" really rings true.
posted by xedrik at 8:34 AM on September 28, 2011

French kids drink coffee starting at a very young age- or at least they did when I was a kid- so you could look for French studies.
posted by mareli at 8:38 AM on September 28, 2011

No.
posted by theora55 at 11:47 AM on September 28, 2011

Malnutrition will stunt your growth. Coffee won't.
posted by caution live frogs at 2:32 PM on September 28, 2011

This may sound ignorant... Guatemalans have been historically short for some time, no? Is coffee really to blame?
posted by InterestedInKnowing at 3:01 PM on September 28, 2011

> This may sound ignorant... Guatemalans have been historically short for some time, no? Is coffee really to blame?

Nope. Malnutrition.
posted by desuetude at 10:41 PM on September 28, 2011

I'll add anecdotal evidence to what desuetude says. A friend adopted a child from Guatemala several years ago, a tiny, frail child who then grew to American proportions once she began getting good food.
posted by MrMoonPie at 12:50 PM on September 29, 2011

Not to derail on Guatemalans, but the chronic malnutrition theory is pretty well-established in the literature. Sorry I can't get to a cite right now.
posted by desuetude at 7:31 PM on September 29, 2011