Latent Variables to Understand Anxiety Perceived by the Undergraduate Student when Faced with Mathematics Courses

Abstract

There could be several causes by which a student may show a symptom of anxiety associated with mathematics courses. Hence, in this paper the findings obtained from a study in southeastern Mexico, specifically in the state of Oaxaca, are shown. Tests were applied to 302 students in different undergraduate programs. The results of the followed statistical procedure allow to state that factors ANSIEVAL, ANSITEM, ANSICOM, ANSINUM, and ANSISIMA are a set of latent variables explaining the feeling of anxiety in students toward math courses (the Bartlett test of sphericity, KMO=0.85, X2=1214.505 with 10 df, Sig.=0.00, p<0.01).

DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2016.v7n2p243