Cognitive, behavioral, and psychophysiological anxiety according to causal self-attributions in mathematics during adolescence

Abstract

In the area of mathematics, students can attribute their academic results of success and failure to multiple causes. Depending on the causal dimensions of these self-attributions, the probability that students experience cognitive, behavioral, and psychophysiological anxiety may increase or decrease. Despite the importance of studying these constructs to better understand students’ behavior, few studies have addressed their relationship in adolescence. The present research aimed to analyze the predictive capacity of causal self-attributions in mathematics on cognitive anxiety, behavioral anxiety, and psychophysiological anxiety. A sample of 432 adolescents aged between 12 and 18 years (M = 14.74; SD = 1.69) was recruited. The participants answered to the School Anxiety Inventory (SAI) and the Sydney Attribution Scale (SAS) voluntarily and anonymously. Various logistic regression models reported an odd ratio (OR) value greater than 1 for the self-attribution of failure in mathematics to effort and ability in the three anxiety responses examined. The OR value was less than 1 for the rest of the causal self-attributions of successes and failures in cognitive, behavioral, and psychophysiological anxiety. These results show that as the scores in causal self-attributions of successes and failures in mathematics to external causes increase, the probability of manifesting high levels of cognitive anxiety, behavioral anxiety and psychophysiological anxiety is lower. On the contrary, as the scores in causal self-attributions of failures in mathematics to internal causes increase, the probability of experiencing high levels of cognitive, behavioral, and psychophysiological anxiety is greater. Consequently, to prevent anxiety, it is necessary to intervene in the type of causal self-attributions chosen by students.