Disentangling the individual and contextual effects of math anxiety: A global perspective

Abstract

Math anxiety is a common affective disorder in students that is characterized by intrusive thoughts that disrupt critical cognitive resources required for math problem-solving. Consistent associations between math anxiety and math achievement have been observed across countries and age groups, placing math anxiety among other important correlates of math achievement, such as socioeconomic status and magnitude representation ability. However, studies examining math anxiety’s relation to achievement have largely focused on the effect of students’ own math anxiety (individual effect), while little is known regarding the effect of math anxiety in students’ educational context (contextual effect). Using three international studies of achievement (n = 1,175,515), we estimated both the individual and contextual effects of math anxiety across the globe. Results suggest that while there are consistent individual effects in virtually all countries examined, the contextual effects are varied, with only approximately half of the countries exhibiting a contextual effect. Additionally, we reveal that teacher confidence in teaching math is associated with a reduction of the individual effect, and country’s level of uncertainty avoidance is related to a lessening of the contextual effect. Finally, we uncovered multiple predictors of math anxiety; notably, student perception of teacher competence was negative related with math anxiety, and parental homework involvement was positively related with math anxiety. Taken together, these results suggest that there are significant between-country differences in how math anxiety may be related with math achievement and suggest that education and cultural contexts as important considerations in understanding math anxiety’s effects on achievement.

Appraisals of previous math experiences play an important role in math anxiety

“…Similarly, in a study of 1000 adults in the U.S. general population, a mean of “some” to “moderate” math anxiety was observed, 5 with math anxiety being normally distributed. Importantly, across the globe, increased math anxiety is associated with decreased achievement in math 6 …”

“…Importantly, across the globe, increased math anxiety is associated with decreased achievement in math. 6 …”

Measurement of mathematics anxiety in an Israeli adult population

“…Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD, 2015) data and maths anxiety review papers (e.g., Dowker et al, 2016) highlight maths anxiety as a global phenomenon (Lau et al, 2022). Lee (2009) conducted factor anal yses on data from 41 PISA 2003 participating countries, which demonstrated that maths anxiety, maths self-efficacy and maths self-concept are universally related yet distinguishable from each other.…”

Perfectionism and L2 Achievement: The Mediating Roles of Motivation and Self-Regulated Learning Among Iranian High School Students

“…This lack of pleasure and enjoyment can be triggered by negative automatic thoughts involving perfectionistic themes that are experienced by individuals high in self-critical perfectionism, causing them to feel anxiety and other negative emotions (Kobori & Tanno, 2005; Stoeber, Kobori & Brown, 2014). The constant worries and intrusive thoughts experienced by perfectionistic individuals can disrupt their cognitive resources especially their working memory which are necessary for the learning process (see Lau, Hawes, Tremblay, & Ansari, 2022). On the other hand, rigid perfectionism particularly SOP dimension can trigger positive perfectionistic cognitions that prompt individuals to focus on achieving their ambitious goals set by themselves (Stoeber et al, 2014), and thus leading to better academic performance.…”