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Previous studies revealed that anxiety holds girls back from performing their best in math.  However, newer research reveals that female math anxiety may just be a myth.

While girls report math anxiety on general survey measures, they are not actually more anxious during math classes and exams, according to findings.

Researchers Thomas Götz and Madeleine Bieg of the University of Konstanz and the Thurgau University of Teacher Education identified a critical limitation of previous studies looking at math anxiety.  In the study, students were asked to describe more generalized perceptions of mathematics anxiety, rather than their anxiety during actual math classes and exams.

Researchers conducted two studies in which they collected data from around 700 students from grades five to 11. For the first experiment, researchers compared students' anxiety about math tests to their real-time self-reports of anxiety directly before and during a math exam. In the second experiment, researchers compared questionnaire measures of math anxiety with repeated real-time assessments obtained during math classes via mobile device.

Researchers said the latest findings supported previous research of gender stereotypes that girls reported more math anxiety than boys on generalized assessments, despite similar math achievement.

However, the results from the second experiment revealed that girls did not experience more anxiety than boys in real-life settings.

Researchers said the findings suggest that lower self-reported competence in mathematics may underlie the discrepancy between the levels of anxiety reported by girls in two settings.

Researchers note that general questionnaires may allow inaccurate beliefs about math ability to negatively bias girls' assessments of their math abilities and exacerbate their math anxiety. Furthermore, stereotyped beliefs regarding math ability, rather than actual ability or anxiety differences, may be largely responsible for girls not choosing to pursue careers in math-intensive domains.

The findings are published in the journal Psychological Science.