This study, Helping Alleviate Statistical Anxiety with Computer Aided Statistics Classes, investigated whether undergraduate students' anxiety about statistics changed when statistics is taught using computers compared to the traditional method. Two groups of students were questioned concerning their anxiety about statistics. One group was taught…

This study investigated the relationship between mathematics anxiety and mathematics teacher efficacy among 156 elementary pre-service teachers from a university in the southeastern United States. Data sources included the Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale (MARS), Mathematics Teaching Efficacy Beliefs Instrument, and pre-service teacher interviews.…

An exploratory factor analysis and several confirmatory analyses were performed to evaluate the factorial structure of the Revised Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale (RMARS) through the responses of 805 college students. On 559 students' scores, the instrument's construct validity was tested through a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and was found…

Submitted the Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale (MARS) (F. Richardson and R. Suinn, 1972) to a reliability generalization analysis to characterize the variability of measurement error in MARS scores across administrations and identify characteristics predictive of score reliability variations. Results for 67 analyses generally support the internal…

The self-worth theory of achievement motivation holds that in situations in which poor performance is likely to reveal low ability, certain students (known as self-worth protective students) intentionally withdraw effort in order to avoid the negative implications of poor performance in terms of damage to self-worth. In this study, evidence of…

The Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale (MARS) (F. Richardson and R. Suinn, 1972) was submitted to a reliability generalization analysis to characterize the variability of measurement error in MARS scores across administrations and to identify possible study characteristics that are predictive of reliability variation. The meta-analysis was performed…

The author reports on data taken from a single case study of a mathsphobic student teacher engaging with a Mathematics content and method course as part of her preservice course in primary teaching. Sample comments are given from the journals of both student and lecturer as the course progresses. The interpretation of this data is then explored…

Using the qualitative research method known as folknography, the authors led a research team to the heart of Illinois farm country to ask the question "What are the perceptions of the people of the Midwest concerning math and math education?" A review of the literature includes Canadian and Australian references on the topic, as well as…

Sixty-five preservice elementary teachers' math anxiety levels and confidence levels to teach elementary mathematics and science were measured. The confidence scores of subjects in different math anxiety groups were compared and the relationships between their math anxiety levels and confidence levels to teach mathematics and science were…

Challenges abstract mathematics requirements in U.S. high schools. Refutes various philosophical and psychological assumptions underlying math instruction, particularly the correlation between simple numbers and the physical world, the math/logical thinking connection, and frequency of use arguments. Suggests that high schools require only one…

Preservice elementary teachers have been shown to generally possess poor mathematical knowledge (e.g. Goulding, Rowland, & Barber, 2002) and also strong negative attitudes toward mathematics (e.g. MacNab & Payne, 2004). Recently, national organizations have proposed interventions to address these issues (Conference Board of the…

United States has produced a generation of students who engage in problem solving without regard for common sense or the text of the problem. Three factors bear the blame: societal beliefs about mathematics, the typical math curriculum, and deficiencies in teacher preparation. New conceptions about learning should help spawn curriculum,…

To take math anxiety out of math instruction, teachers need to first know how to easily diagnose it in their students and second, how to analyze causes. Results of a recent study revealed that while students believed that their math anxiety was largely related to a lack of mathematical understanding, they often blamed their teachers for causing…

Having taught developmental mathematics for a number of years, the author is keenly aware of the effects of math anxiety on developmental math students. Math-anxious students complain of such things as nervousness, inability to concentrate, a blank mind, and a feeling of sickness when they are confronted with taking a math test. Math anxiety is…

One college math anxiety reduction clinic uses various techniques to change student attitudes toward math, including publicity and consciousness raising about the problem, having students write their "math autobiographies," group discussion and support, a divided-page exercise for recording feelings of anxiety, and assertiveness training for math…