Math Anxiety: Personal, Educational, and Cognitive Consequences

TLDR

Math anxiety causes avoidance of math, undermines competence and career prospects, and impairs working‑memory processes, though its origins remain unclear and certain teaching styles may increase risk. The study seeks to investigate the origins of math anxiety and its neural signature to examine emotional and cognitive components. Timed online tests show math‑anxiety effects on simple arithmetic, whereas achievement tests do not reveal competence differences.

Abstract

Highly math-anxious individuals are characterized by a strong tendency to avoid math, which ultimately undercuts their math competence and forecloses important career paths. But timed, on-line tests reveal math-anxiety effects on whole-number arithmetic problems (e.g., 46 + 27), whereas achievement tests show no competence differences. Math anxiety disrupts cognitive processing by compromising ongoing activity in working memory. Although the causes of math anxiety are undetermined, some teaching styles are implicated as risk factors. We need research on the origins of math anxiety and on its “signature” in brain activity, to examine both its emotional and its cognitive components.