What is it about?
Math anxiety is the worry, tension and nervousness that some students feel when doing math. These feelings may affect learning and shape academic choices and future opportunities. In this study, we examined two important questions: 1) whether students who experience math anxiety continue to show it as they grow older, that is, whether math anxiety remains stable, and 2) how math anxiety and math performance relate over time. To answer these questions, we analyzed data from 62 longitudinal studies that followed nearly 40,000 students over several months or years. We found that math anxiety is fairly stable. Students who develop math anxiety early on (for example, in primary school) are likely to continue experiencing it later; and this stability increases as students get older, similar to a personality trait. At the same time, math anxiety is less stable when measurements are spaced farther apart, suggesting that specific experiences can influence its development. In addition, we also found that math anxiety and math performance are reciprocally related over time. Lower math scores can increase future math anxiety, and higher anxiety can in turn undermine future performance. This creates a self-reinforcing cycle that makes difficulties harder to overcome.
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Why is it important?
These findings show the importance of early identification and support. Because math anxiety becomes more stable as students get older, early intervention may be key to preventing it from becoming firmly established. At the same time, math anxiety remains changeable even in older students, so it is never too late to provide help. Finally, because math anxiety and math performance reinforce each other, interventions targeting either emotions or skills, or ideally both, may break the cycle and help all students succeed in math. Teachers need the right tools and training to identify and support students who are vulnerable to math anxiety.
Perspectives
Our study shows clear patterns in how math anxiety develops. Once it appears, even in young children, it often continues and becomes more stable as students get older. This suggests that early prevention and support are especially important, before anxiety becomes more entrenched. At the same time, our findings suggest that addressing math anxiety whenever it is present can break the self-reinforcing cycle we observed between high anxiety and low performance.
Santiago Pelegrina
Universidad de Jaen
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Stability of math anxiety and its relation with math performance over time: A meta-analysis of longitudinal studies., Journal of Educational Psychology, December 2025, American Psychological Association (APA),
DOI: 10.1037/edu0001008.
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