A General Math Anxiety Measure

Abstract

Math anxiety is a psychological burden that can hinder individuals across their lifetimes. However, the current literature lacks a valid measure of math anxiety that can be used across instructional modalities and among non-student populations. As such, it is difficult to assess math anxiety in virtual learning environments, track math anxiety across lifetimes, or determine the utility of math anxiety inoculations for non-student populations. This study presents a validity portfolio for a generalized math anxiety measure that can be used across teaching modalities, across lifetimes, and is simple enough to be used cross-culturally. The measure yielded evidence of validity when used in all tested samples: the United States (student and non-student samples), New Zealand (student and non-student samples), Kyrgyzstan (non-student sample), Turkey (non-student sample), Russia (non-student sample), and Thailand (non-student sample). The data support the use of the new math anxiety measure free of context.