Most college students are required to enroll in statistics and quantitative research methodology courses as a necessary part of their degree programmes. Unfortunately, many students report high levels of statistics anxiety while enrolled in these classes. Recent years have seen an increase in the number of articles on statistics anxiety appearing in the literature, as researchers have recognised that statistics anxiety is a multidimensionality construct that has debilitative effects on academic performance. Thus, the purpose of this article is to provide a comprehensive summary of the literature on statistics anxiety. In particular, the nature, etiology, and prevalence of statistics anxiety are described. Additionally, antecedents (i.e. dispositional, situational and environmental) of statistics anxiety are identified, as well as their effects on statistics achievement. Furthermore, existing measures of statistics anxiety are documented. Finally, based on the literature, successful interventions for reducing statistics anxiety are described. Implications for future research are provided.
The CAUSE Research Group is supported in part by a member initiative grant from the American Statistical Association’s Section on Statistics and Data Science Education