Do apples help wake a person up, and if so why

Factual Questions
1

Due to insomnia last night I only got 3 hours of sleep. This morning I had 1.5 cups of coffee but I remember hearing that apples help you stay awake too, so I ate two of those for breakfast. They seem to be working since I haven’t really felt tired. Is there any science behind this? When I try to look this info up on google using keywords like ‘apples tired’ all I get is articles on Apple computers trying to improve their business.

2

My uneducated guess would be sugar.

Apples have a good bit of sugar which can give you a quick but temporary pick-me-up.

3

I dont know, they only have about 20g of sugar each.

4

40g of sugar is a considerable amount. Additionally, you can’t rule out the placebo effect in this case, and the early stages of digestion are arousing (i.e., they increase wakefulness).

5

I wouldn’t discount the coffee either. 1.5 cups of coffee is a bit of caffeine. To really test it out you’d have to get 3 hours of sleep and then eat only apples in the morning, no coffee. Then compare that to 3 hours of sleep and only drinking 1.5 cups of coffee and no apples. Of course, since the whole things is very subjective, it’s not exactly a rigorous test, but at least you could see if the apples things works for you.

6

It’s also my understanding that in fruits, this is “simple sugar”

**simple sugar on the Web:

monosaccharide: a sugar (like sucrose or fructose) that does not hydrolyse to give other sugars; the simplest group of carbohydrates
www.cogsci.princeton.edu/cgi-bin/webwn**

I’ve heard it’s more readily used by the body than more complex sugars and therefor acts more quickly.

But then again IANA nutritionist so I can’t say for sure.

7

Sucrose is not a monosaccharide. It is a disaccharide consisting of one glucose molecule and one fructose molecule.

8

I believe apples contain fructose, not sucrose.

9

Apples are also a good source of Malic acid, which, at least anecdotally increases alertness.

10

Fructose is very slow-digesting as simple sugars go. Vegan/vegetarian bodybuilders will recommend an apple about an hour before a workout for energy.