Parental involvement and math anxiety: a dual pathway to the math anxiety of children

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Objective Despite the importance of parental factors in the math anxiety of children, the influence of the interaction between parental involvement and parental math anxiety on the math anxiety of children has not been sufficiently explored. This study is aimed at investigating how parental math anxiety moderates the association of parental involvement with the math anxiety of children. Methods Data were collected from 450 seventh-grade students and their parents in China, including parental involvement, parental math anxiety and the math anxiety of children. Process Model 1 was used to perform moderated regression analysis. Results Relationship analysis indicated that mother ( r = −0.15, p < 0.01) and father involvement ( r = −0.18, p < 0.01) both showed a significant negative correlation with the math anxiety of children. In addition, parental math anxiety exhibited a significant positive correlation with the math anxiety of children ( r = 0.29, p < 0.01). Mother involvement significantly interacted with parental math anxiety ( β = −0.12, p = 0.017, 95% CI [−0.21, −0.02]), and father involvement also significantly interacted with parental math anxiety ( β = −0.12, p < 0.01, 95% confidence interval (CI) [−0.20, −0.04]). Specifically, the negative relationship of parental involvement with the math anxiety of children was significant only among parents with high (mother involvement: β = −0.259, p < 0.05; father involvement: β = −0.292, p < 0.05) rather than low math anxiety (mother: β = −0.029, p > 0.05; father: β = −0.053, p > 0.05). Furthermore, gender analysis demonstrated that this moderating effect was significant only for girls instead of boys. Conclusion Parental math anxiety moderates the association of parental involvement with the math anxiety of children. Overall, parental involvement is negatively linked to the math anxiety of children (significant main effect). After parental math anxiety was included as a moderator, this negative relationship was present only in the group with high parental math anxiety and was non-significant in the group with low parental math anxiety. This finding poses a challenge to the assumption that “high parental math anxiety is necessarily harmful”. Furthermore, this moderating effect was more pronounced among girls.