| Mathematics anxiety is a state of feeling of tension, apprehension when the individual dealing withe all kinds of the mathematics relates scenes,which interferes with the solving of mathematical problems. Processing efficiency theory, inhibition theory and attentional control theory can help us to explain the effects of mathematics anxiety on mathematical performance. Processing efficiency theory is focused on the limit of working memory resources, mainly related to the storage and processing function of working memory system. Inhibition theory is focused on the content of working memory, mainly related to the control function of working memory. Attentional control theory is a newly theory, focused on the limit of attention resources, mainly related on the central executive system of attentional control. However, there is still lack of some systemic experiments to examine it's major theoretical assumptions. In addition, at present the existing researches is more inclined to support the processing efficiency theory. Therefore, based on the attentional control theory and the processing efficiency theory and previous studies, this study try to explore the two theories, whether can explain the mechanism of mathematics anxiety affecting mathematical task performance.In this study, we selected the college students in Inner Mongolia Normal University as our subjects, through four experiments in three parts to verify the theories of mathematical anxiety. First of all, through experiment 1 and 2, we investigated the sensitivity of high mathematics anxiety to numerical stimulus, to explore whether the mathematics anxiety disturb the inhibiting capacity of negative emotional stimulus. In experiment 3, we investigated the relationship between mathematics anxiety and the degree of task difficulty. In experiment 4, we investigated the relationship among mathematics anxiety, the degree of task difficulty and working memory load.The results showed that:(1) There is no significant difference between the high- and low mathematics anxiety groups in the number tasks, same as in letter tasks. Mathematics anxiety does not affect the sensitivity of high mathematics anxiety individuals. Mathematics anxiety has no harm to the inhibition of high mathematics anxiety individuals.(2) To high mathematics anxiety group, there is no significant difference between the mental arithmetic tasks under the two working memory load conditions, same as the low mathematics anxiety group. Mathematics anxiety has no harm to the shifting function of high mathematics anxiety individuals.(3) There is a significant interaction between mathematics anxiety and the degree of task difficulty. The RT in complex tasks of high mathematics anxiety group is significantly longer than that of low mathematics anxiety group, and the average accuracy in complex tasks of high mathematics anxiety group is significantly lower than that of low mathematics anxiety group; and there is no significant difference between high-and low mathematics anxiety groups in simple tasks. It shows that the influence of mathematics anxiety on mathematics task must be reflected in a certain task difficulty.(4) Under the high working memory load condition, mathematics anxiety both affect the performance of simple mental arithmetic task and complex mental arithmetic task; while under the non working memory load condition, mathematics anxiety only affects the performance of complex mental arithmetic task. The mechanism of mathematics anxiety is the working memory system.On the whole, the study supports the processing efficiency theory. |
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