Abstract
This online study investigated the relationship between caffeine consumption and risky decision-making for two distinct types of reward: caffeine-related (coffee gift card) or a control (food gift card). A modified version of the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART) featuring a dual-reward design was developed, which participants completed along with various surveys to assess their average and current caffeine intake, caffeine cravings, and risk-taking propensity. Our results show that those who had a lower current caffeine intake took more risks in the BART in all measures. However, we did not find any differences in risk-taking for caffeine-related rewards in the BART task compared to non-caffeine rewards. These findings suggest that daily caffeine consumers may have higher risk-taking propensity when consuming less caffeine.