Mathematics is typically conceived of as being a core discipline in curricula at all levels of education. For this reason, mathematics achievement is crucial to student placement, selection, and admission across most educational systems around the world. This information is also highly relevant in view of the fact that testing is a common practice in contemporary society, which is widely used to make important decisions about an individual’s status across primary, secondary, and higher education (Zeidner, 1998). Test anxiety, however, is a key affective variable can impede both achievement in general (Cassady & Johnson, 2002) and mathematics achievement in particular (Higbee & Thomas, 1999). It is defined as a subjective emotional state that includes a set of cognitive, physiological, and behavioral responses to concerns about possible fear of failure, experienced before or during an evaluative situation (Bodas et al., 2008). It has detrimental effects on schooling, occupational, and overall life outcomes (von der Embse et al., 2015). It is widely acknowledged that high level of test anxiety is associated with lower level of performance (Ng & Lee, 2015). Since students have to cope with constant mathematics pressure at school, it is of major interest for teachers and researchers to identify and strengthen/weaken those factors in students, which primarily influence mathematics achievement negatively. Additionally, metacognition plays an important role in mathematics achievement, as it shapes students’ conscious use and control of their own cognitive functions in educational settings (Brown, 1987). Metacognition is causally referred to as one’s awareness and regulation of own cognitive processes consisting of two components: knowledge of cognition and regulation of cognition (Flavell, 1979). Although research on metacognition has made it quite clear that highly metacognitive students perform better than their less metacognitive counterparts on most performance assessments including mathematics tests, the role of test anxiety in activating metacognitive knowledge and regulatory processes, are much less clear (Hacker et al., 1998). It has been suggested that the impact of affective factors such as test anxiety on performance is also related to metacognition (Zeidner, 1998). However, previous studies have predominantly examined the effect of each variable in isolation, and mainly in relation to general performance that place little demand on specifically mathematics achievement. 

There is a vast amount of empirical evidence for the influence of test anxiety on metacognition and mathematics achievement as well as the impact of metacognition on mathematics achievement (e.g., Miesner & Maki, 2007; Sherman & Wither, 2003). Despite this, the combined importance of test anxiety and metacognition in mathematics achievement has been largely ignored, as most studies approach test anxiety in the form of math anxiety whereas others neglected metacognition. To the best of our knowledge based on a comprehensive review of literature undertaken, only two studies (Tok, 2013; Veenman et al., 2000) were conducted that in a sense harmonizes with our emphasis on the differential effects of test anxiety, metacognition, and mathematics achievement on one another.

More specifically, little is known about how these affective and cognitive factors differentially contribute to individual differences in mathematics achievement. This question added significance in light of the researchers, who suggested that “the relationship between test anxiety and metacognition may be a worthwhile field for research, while simultaneously helping to establish links between affect and cognition more generally” (e.g., Zeidner, 1998). Specifically, we hypothesized that: (a) test anxiety would significantly effect metacognition and mathematics achievement (H1); (b) metacognition would significantly effect mathematics achievement (H2); and (c) metacognition would mediate the relationship between test anxiety and mathematics achievement (H3).

Participants 943 students (442 males and 501 females) from five public middle schools (477 seventh and 466 eighth graders) in Turkey participated in the present study. Measurements Children’s Test Anxiety Scale (CTAS). The Turkish adaption (Aydın & Bulgan, 2017) of the CTAS (α= .88), which was originally developed by Wren and Benson (2004) was used to measure students’ test anxiety. The 30-item scale comprised three subscales – Thoughts (α= .82); Off-Task Behaviors (α= .72); and Autonomic Reactions (α= .75). Students responded to each statement of the CTAS on a 4-point scale: (1) almost never, (2) some of the time, (3) most of the time, and (4) almost always. The possible scores on the CTAS ranged from 30 to 120. Junior Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (Jr. MAI). The Turkish adaption (Aydın & Ubuz, 2010) of the Jr. MAI (α= .85), which was originally developed by Sperling et al. (2002) was used to measure students’ metacognition. The 17-item inventory comprised two subdimensions – Knowledge of Cognition (α= .75) and Regulation of Cognition (α= .79). Students responded to each statement of the Jr. MAI on a 5-point scale: (1) never, (2) seldom, (3) sometimes, (4) often, and (5) always. The possible scores on the Jr. MAI ranged from 18 to 90. Mathematics Achievement Test (MAT). The researcher developed MAT was used to assess students’ mathematics achievement. The test was composed of 18 multiple-choice items originally released by the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) from those used in TIMSS 2007, 2011, and 2015. The items, adapted into Turkish, were released by the Ministry of National Education (available from http://timss.meb.gov.tr/www/aciklanan-sorular/icerik/1). These items were reviewed in terms of their content domains (i.e., Number, Algebra, Geometry, and Data and Chance) and cognitive domains (i.e., Knowing, Applying, and Reasoning) by two middle school teachers with over 20 years of experience, and a staff member in mathematics education, who had expertise in cross-cultural comparisons in international assessments. Possible scores on the test ranged from 0 to 18. Procedure The data were collected during the spring semester of the 2018/2019 academic year. Students completed the CTAS, Jr. MAI, and MAT in two consecutive mathematics classes (each 40 minutes). Data Analysis The first two hypotheses (H1 and H2) were tested by performing a one-way multivariate analysis of variance (One-Way MANOVA), whereas the last hypothesis (H3) was tested using a one-way analysis of covariance (One-Way ANCOVA) via SPSS version 21.0.

Descriptive Statistics Results showed that students reported moderate test anxiety (M= 63.82, SD= 14.99), metacognition (M= 63.14, SD= 11.18), and moderate-to-high mathematics achievement (M= 10.15, SD= 4.24). Inferential Statistics The Effect of Test Anxiety on Metacognition and Mathematics Achievement A one-way MANOVA was conducted to explore the impact of test anxiety on metacognition and mathematics achievement (H1). There was a statistically significant difference among low-, moderate-, and high-test anxious students on the combined dependent variables, metacognition and mathematics achievement, F(4, 1836)= 3.75, p= .005; Wilks’ Lambda= .98; partial η^2= .008. The Effect of Metacognition on Mathematics Achievement A one-way ANOVA was conducted to compare mean scores of the low-, moderate-, and high-metacognitive students on their mathematics achievement (H2). The analysis yielded significant differences, F(2, 940)= 29.61, p= .000, partial η^2 = .05, among the students who are low-, moderate-, and high-metacognitive in performing mathematics. Metacognition as a Mediator A one-way ANCOVA was used to test whether metacognition can mediate the effect of test anxiety on mathematics achievement (H3). Results revealed that the effect of test anxiety on mathematics achievement became nonsignificant, F(2, 937)= .98, p= .373, partial η^2 = .02 when controlling for the effect of metacognition, indicating that metacognition plays a significant role in the effect of test anxiety on mathematics achievement. These findings supported previous research indicating the differential effects of test anxiety on metacognition (Miesner & Maki, 2007) as well as the role of metacognition in prompting students’ mathematics performance (Bond & Ellis, 2013). While the research context is Turkey, the findings of the present study can be valuable both for European contexts and for international context considering that the national characteristics have an impact for rendering more precise information about the cognitive and affective factors affecting mathematics achievement, as proposed by Higbee and Thomas (1999).

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