How are different math knowledge presentations associated with math anxiety?

Abstract

A close relationship between math performance and math anxiety has been demonstrated, but how different presentations of mathematics are associated with math anxiety has not been investigated. This study recruited 826 elementary school students in grades 5 and 6. All students were given math trait and state anxiety questionnaires; a nonverbal matrix reasoning task; and verbalized, symbolic, and situational fraction problem-solving tasks. After data cleaning, 475 boys and 323 girls (798 in total) were included in the analysis (mean age = 11.79, SD = 0.82). Partial correlation analysis showed that students' math traits and state anxiety were more closely related to symbolic fraction problem-solving than to verbalized and situational fraction problem-solving. Mixed linear model analysis showed that math state anxiety for symbolic problem-solving was significantly greater than that for verbalized and situational problem-solving. Based on these findings, we concluded that the presentation of symbolic math is more likely to induce math anxiety than verbalized or situational math. This finding has potential practical applications in math anxiety interventions and education.