What is Maths Anxiety

 Ashcraft (2002) defines maths anxiety as ‘a feeling of tension, apprehension, or fear that interferes with maths performance '. In other words, Maths anxiety is any  negative emotional reaction to mathematics, leading to helplessnes,panic and disorganization. The fear of Math is not restricted by age or gender.  Because math anxiety affects many people and is related to poor math  skills, it is important to understand when and how math anxiety first  appears, what is happening in the brain when people are feeling anxious  about math, and how to best help people with math anxiety.
There are three theories that link maths anxiety and maths performance:

1. Poor performance leads to higher maths anxiety (deficit theory)
2. A vicious cycle: higher anxiety contributes to poor performance; poor performance contributes to higher anxiety (reciprocal theory)
3. Maths anxiety leads to poor performance in maths (anxiety model)

Although research has shown that math anxiety and math abilities are related,  no study so far has been able to tell us which comes first. In other  words, we do not know if being bad at math causes math anxiety, or if  having math anxiety makes people bad at math.