Neural Bases of Mathematical Anxiety – implications for the teaching-learning process

Abstract Mathematical Anxiety is a global phenomenon and highly prevalent, possessing physiological, cognitive, and behavioral markers. However, little is known about its underlying neural mechanisms. We provide a Systematic Review of studies that have investigated the neural correlates of Mathematical Anxiety in the last decade and discuss its implications for the teaching-learning process. We selected studies that made brain measurements of individuals with Mathematical Anxiety through electronic databases, considering the delineated inclusion and exclusion criteria. The quality of the literature was analyzed from the 11 items of the PEDro quality scale and conducted by the selection flowchart of PRISMA studies, resulting in the inclusion of 13 neuroscientific studies. In general, literature suggests that neural bases of fear and pain are stimulated by Mathematical Anxiety before and during numerical tasks. There is a reduced capacity for Working Memory and Attention Deficit / Inhibition in individuals with high Mathematical Anxiety. They are also more likely to make mistakes in mathematical tasks, have less precise representations of numerical magnitude, approach math problems differently from their less anxious peers, and tend to raise more cognitive control resources to complete goals with aversive stimuli, processing efficiency and generating performance deficits. Results also support that the effects of Mathematical Anxiety are associated with less cortical activation during the initial stages of numerical stimuli processing, regardless of task complexity.