Task difficulty sensitivity mediates the relationship between math anxiety and math avoidance tendency¶
Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associationalr2·q3
Currency · newest study 2025 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person
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q3 i? Task difficulty sensitivity (the DDM task difficulty coefficient) significantly mediated the path from math anxiety scores to math avoidance behavior (indirect path 1). → Jie Liu 2025
Evidence¶
Jie Liu 2025¶
Jie Liu, Zhifeng Li, Jiawang Yang, Hao He & Fang Cui. (2025). The neurocognitive mechanism underlying math avoidance among math anxious people. npj Science of Learning 10:50. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-025-00343-0
q3 · i? · associational · r2
Chain mediation (PROCESS model 6, 5000 bootstrap samples) tested whether DDM difficulty sensitivity (M1) and ROI BOLD activity (M2) mediate math anxiety scores to avoidance (difference in accept choices between difficulties). Path 1 effects were significant, e.g. 0.15 via the HPC model (95% CI excluding zero).
"significant chain mediation effects were observed in three of the above-mentioned ROIs: the HPC, the PI and the MCC. For the HPC, the indirect effect for all the three pathways were significant. The effect value is 0.15 for indirect path1 (95%CI: (0.00–0.29]),"
Discussion¶
Related Claims¶
- Hippocampal, posterior insula and mid-cingulate activation mediate the math anxiety–avoidance relationship via reduced activation discrepancy between difficulties — related
- HMA individuals show heightened sensitivity to task difficulty but not reward in drift-diffusion modeling of math decisions — related
- Functional connectivity among six task-difficulty-sensitive ROIs classifies HMA versus LMA individuals at 70.49% accuracy, with PI–MCC, HPC–precuneus and TPJ–NAc edges most diagnostic — related
- Mathematical metacognition statistically mediates the association between mathematics anxiety and children's word problem solving after controlling for IQ
- Under high task difficulty, HMA individuals accept significantly fewer math problem challenges than LMA individuals, with no group difference under low difficulty
- HMA individuals show weaker brain activation discrepancy between high and low task difficulty than LMA peers in valuation and cognitive control regions
Page metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
type |
claim |
id |
difficulty-sensitivity-mediation-math-avoidance |
title |
Task difficulty sensitivity mediates the relationship between math anxiety and math avoidance tendency |
description |
Task difficulty sensitivity mediates the relationship between math anxiety and math avoidance tendency |
status |
review |
evidence_strength |
moderate |
newest_evidence |
2025 |
generated |
by process:wiki-ingest on 2026-10-26 |
trust |
unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content |
sources |
1 — jie-liu-2025 |
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