The modern coffee drink — Are some people becoming dependent on these sugary, caffeinated concoctions?

Espresso. Cappuccino. Latte. Americano. Cold Brew. Drip coffee.

Venti. Grande. Dark roast. Light roast. Barista.

French press. Fair trade. Ethically sourced.

These words and phrases have taken a common place in our collective lexicon. And that is because people worldwide are drinking coffee more and more. This once humble drink, originating from Ethiopia many centuries ago, simply the juice of beans, has changed modern culture, to a degree. The young, the old, white, Black, Latino, rural, urban — it seems everyone drinks coffee anymore.

Who does not drink coffee anymore? Over 2.25 billion cups of coffee are consumed every day, according to Wikipedia. Drive Research says that 87% of Americans have a “strong affinity” for coffee. And the global coffee market is over $126 billion, according to Mordor Intelligence.

But people worldwide are not just drinking coffee on its own. We have taken to sweetening our coffee — and then sweetening it some more. We are sweetening it not just with sugar, but with the vast array of sweet options provided nowadays: caramel. vanilla. mocha. java chip. raspberry. And so on.

A downside exists, however, to consuming so many sugary, sweet coffee drinks: some people are possibly becoming physically dependent on these sugary, caffeinated beverages.

It did not used to be like this. Back in the 1960s and 1970s, for example, people drank instant coffee, such as Folgers. People in the past would sometimes have a coffee after a meal at a restaurant. Some would occasionally go to a cafe. Many people drank their coffee black. Or maybe, to reduce the bitterness of the coffee, they put a cube of sugar or two in their cup.

Nowadays, however, we have gone from basic black coffee to fancy, sugary creations. The sweet options are almost overwhelming now: the aforementioned caramel, vanilla, mocha, raspberry, and java chip — but also pumpkin spice, cinnamon dolce, hazel nut, toffee nut, whipped cream, sprinkles, and so on. All of these sweeteners are sugar, in one form or another.

From the growth and dominance of Starbucks, from the growth of other coffee chains like Peet’s, Dunkin’ and Coffee Bean, and from the growth of independent coffee shops and cafes, the options to sweeten one’s coffee are almost endless anymore. A panoply of sweet options exist — it is seemingly sugar everywhere now. A whirlwind amalgam of caffeine and sugar can be found in so many places.

Desi Harpe, born and raised in San Diego, never drank coffee for most of her life. She would drink tea, or soda, or water. But as Starbucks rose to prominence around the turn of the century, her behavior changed. Harpe said she did not drink coffee before the 1990s because she did not like the taste.

But then she started going to Starbucks with classmates. Harpe realized she did not like their unsweetened coffee drinks. But she had a strong preference for the sweet drinks.

“That is the only drink I got — mocha. I always got the mocha,” Harpe said. “I do not like black coffee.”

The WHO recommends most people have about 25 grams or less of sugar per day.

But the venti (large) Starbucks java chip frappuccino has 80 grams of sugar. The venti caramel ribbon crunch frappuccino (also from Starbucks) has 78 grams of sugar. And a Starbucks medium-sized pumpkin spice latte has 50 grams of sugar.

And it is not just Starbucks that is loading their drinks with sugar. A consumer group called Which? looked at the frappes and frappuccinos being served by the three biggest coffee chains in the world. Many of their regular-sized drinks contained greater than the recommended daily allowance of sugar. One medium drink often has more sugar than an adult should consume in an entire day.

And one final example — a Dunkin’ large caramel swirl frozen coffee with cream has 172 grams of sugar. That is 34 teaspoons of sugar. That one drink is almost seven times as much sugar as one should have for the entire day.

Besides the adverse health consequences of consuming too much sugar, a possible connection exists between sugar and dependence:

In the article “Experts agree: Sugar Might Be as Addictive as Cocaine,” Nicole Avena, PhD in Pharmacological Studies, says there are “neurochemical changes in the brain that occur when we overeat sugar that are similar to what is seen with addictions to drugs, like alcohol or morphine.”

A group of French researchers published an article called “Sugar addiction: pushing the drug-sugar analogy to the limit.” They came to the conclusion that sweets and sugar cannot only act as a replacement to addictive drugs like cocaine, but that the sugar can be even more rewarding and gratifying.

The website www.addictioncenter.com cites a dopamine release after sugar consumption which leads to a “short-term high.” It connects the addictive properties of cocaine to the addictive properties of sugar (the effects of sugar, however, are significantly less than the effects of cocaine).

And a Princeton study led by Bart Hoebel called “A Behavioral and Circuit Model Based on Sugar Addiction in Rats” showed that rats can become physically dependent on sugar. Dopamine increased in their brains as they ate sugar. In short, changes in the behaviors and brains of the rats were quite similar to the effects of drugs of abuse such as heroin.

So from the above studies, it is within the realm of possibility that sugar causes some level of physical dependence in humans. It is within the realm of possibility that people around the world are drinking so many coffee drinks for both the caffeine and the sugar.

Note that scientists generally believe that sugar is not addictive — not in the way that cocaine and heroin are addictive. In fact, sugar is simply not physically addictive, according to many experts. This does seemingly contradict the four cited studies above.

Ultimately, whether one can be dependent on sugar is not clear-cut. Terms like addiction and dependence can be defined in different ways. And there is a difference between natural addiction and drug addiction. So there is some gray area — as for sugar dependence.

But why are 3-year-old kids walking into Starbucks, asking mommy for a cake pop and a frappuccino? Why are so many hanging out in coffee houses for hours at a time, having two or three caramel lattes? Is it the coffee? Or is it the sugar?

Harpe now starts every morning with a sweetened coffee. And she has at least two sweetened coffee drinks per day.

Harpe says she does not go to Starbucks much anymore. She simply gets her coffee elsewhere.

She has moved on from mocha as well. But she has not moved on from the sweet, sugary drinks. “I would not drink my coffee any other way than with sugar,” Harpe said. “I only get vanilla [now] — always vanilla.”

Coffee is complex. We drink coffee for the caffeine, the social connection and the ambiance — the ritual and romance of experiencing espresso. It is not just the drink. It is the whole experience — the aroma and the ambiance and the sights in the coffee house and the sounds of the street outside.

The smell and taste of coffee are comforting. Routine is comforting. Notably, indulging a sweet tooth may be comforting as well.

And that may be a problem, as it is possible we are becoming physically dependent on these sweet, savory coffee drinks — physically dependent to a degree.

Along with the aroma and ambiance, coffee is essentially a double whammy of caffeine and sugar. It is a caffeine fix and a sugar high.

In the end, that just may be bittersweet.