Test anxiety versus academic skills: a comparison of two alternative models for predicting performance in a...

Two competing theoretical models to explain academic performance were proposed. The interference model stresses the detrimental effect of task-irrelevant thoughts during the test-taking situation whereas the deficit model suggests Study Habits and domain-specific skills as main predictors of test performance.

The study compares the two models by determining the relative contribution of Test Anxiety, Study Habits, and Maths Skill to performance in a statistics exam.

Sixty-six undergraduate students who were enrolled in the first semester of two parallel introductory statistic courses participated in the study.

Hierarchical regression analyses were performed on the performance in the final statistics exam. The unique variance attributable to Test Anxiety, Study Habits, and Maths Skill was calculated.

Both Maths Skill and Test Anxiety added unique variance in explaining performance, whereas Study Habits did not. Although Maths Skill emerged as relatively more important than Test Anxiety, a purely deficit-based account nevertheless appears untenable because interfering effects of Test Anxiety during the examination also contributed an important portion of variance.

It is recommended that cognitive-attentional accounts stressing test anxiety be supplemented by a deficit formulation, and that multimodal counselling address both Test Anxiety and skill deficits.

Methodological problems in investigating the causal relationship between skill deficits, anxiety, and performance are discussed.