Faculty of Education - Theses

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Author: Makin, Graeme John × End date: 1979 × Start date: 1979 × Subject: Study and teaching (Primary) ×

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    The effects of trait anxiety, mathematical ability, method of testing, task difficulty, and their interactions, on state anxiety and performance in mathematics at primary school
    Makin, Graeme John ( 1979)
    A review was made of the theoretical and research literature related to the trait-state concept of anxiety, the relationship of anxiety to academic performance; and some factors confounding the anxiety, performance relationship. A study investigating the differential effect of anxiety on performance under two different methods of testing was reviewed. A study to replicate the findings related to anxiety, performance and varying test precedures was proposed. Data collected in the study made possible an investigation of Spielberger's Trait-State concept of anxiety and Spence's Drive Theory. One hundred and seventy six male, State primary school children drawn from sixteen grade five and six classes took part in the study. All testing was carried out in term I of 1978. As hypothesized the formal method of testing proved to be more anxiety arousing than the informal method of testing and students performed better under the latter testing procedure. Low anxious students performed better than high anxious students under both testing conditions. The study provided further support for Spielberger's Trait-State anxiety theory with high trait anxious students displaying higher levels of state anxiety than law trait anxious students, confirming that the State-A scale is a sensitive device for measuring differential anxiety arousal. The hypotheses related to Spence's Drive Theory were only partially supported by the results. Explanations as to why the interaction between task difficulty, ability and anxiety might not have been significant in this study were discussed. In general this study found evidence confirming the notion that high anxiety hinders performance, particularly for low ability students.