Examining test anxiety in terms of academic expectations stress and motivation to study

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship between the exam anxiety level of middle school students, their academic expectations stress, and level of motivation to study lesson. The study group consisted of 364 (184 female and 180 male) 7th and 8th grade secondary school students. Three instruments were used for data collection; Academic Expectations Stress Inventory, Motivation to Study for Adolescences Scale and Exam Anxiety Scale. Exam anxiety was chosen as dependent variable while academic expectations stress and motivation to study lesson were set as independent variables. In the current study, the relationship between variables was examined by Pearson correlation coefficient and whether independent variables predict dependent variable or not was tested by multiple regression analysis. As a result of correlational analysis, a positive and significant relationship was observed between teacher/parental expectations, self-expectations, amotivation and exam anxiety. On the other hand, intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation were not associated with exam anxiety. As a result of regression analysis, it was concluded that family/teacher expectations, self-expectations, amotivation, and extrinsic motivation significantly predicted exam anxiety.

Identifying Profiles of Anxiety in Late Childhood and Exploring Their Relationship with School-Based Distress

“…The High Anxiety profile also scored significantly higher in PI, E, and B but, in this case, with large effect sizes. This finding is consistent with the positive and significant correlations found between anxiety and school-based distress in previous literature (e.g., [35,36,43]) and in this study, evidencing that students with high levels of anxiety tend to be more sensitive to stressors in the school setting and to manifest distress symptoms. Likewise, the present work provides interesting information from the person-centered approach used.…”

“…The results revealed a positive and significant association between each form of anxiety (i.e., AA, SA, and GA) and each source (i.e., TI, AS, PI, ASC) and manifestation (i.e., E, B, PH) of distress. This finding corroborates Hypothesis 1 and is in line with previous works that identified positive and significant correlations between school-based distress and anxiety [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35] and between school-based distress and two different forms of anxiety: school anxiety [42,43] and test anxiety [10,[36][37][38][39][40][41]. It should be noted that this research revealed a small magnitude for all correlations, except for the association of AA, SA, and GA with the emotional manifestation of school-based distress, which showed a moderate magnitude.…”

“…The relationship between anxiety and school-based distress has been analyzed in several works. These studies coincide in finding a positive and significant association of schoolbased distress with anxiety [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35], test anxiety [10,[36][37][38][39][40][41], and school anxiety [42,43]. Regarding the sample's characteristics, except for two studies with children [28,42], all of them focused on adolescents or university students.…”

“…Specifically, we examined, in the first place, the correlations between both variables, considering three forms of anxiety (i.e., anticipatory anxiety, school-based performance anxiety, and generalized anxiety) highlighted by Bernstein and Garfinkel [4] and the sources of distress (i.e., interactions, academic stress, peer interactions, academic self-concept) and the manifestations of distress (i.e., emotional, behavioral, and physiological) established by Helms and Gable [15]. Given that a positive and significant association has been found of school-based distress with anxiety (e.g., [35]), test anxiety (e.g., [36]), and school anxiety (e.g., [43]), we expected to find positive and significant correlations between all the forms of anxiety and all the sources and manifestations of distress (Hypothesis 1).…”

Psychological symptoms in high achieving students: The multiple mediating effects of parental achievement pressure, perfectionism, and academic expectation stress

“…This situation may result in back and neck pain, headaches, insomnia, and social withdrawal (Feld & Shusterman, 2015; Galloway et al, 2013). Academic stress increases test anxiety (Çelik & Yıldırım, 2019), and reduces psychological resilience (Wilks, 2008) and subjective well‐being (Choi et al, 2019). When examined from this perspective, academic stress increases the risk factors for negative psychological impacts on students and reduces protective features.…”