Language and Mathematics Performance: A Systematic Umbrella Review and Meta-Meta-Analysis

With the aim of determining the relationship between language and mathematics performance using a more general approach, this study examines the findings of primary meta-analyses using the meta-meta-analysis method. To achieve this, the study synthesized 12 independent primary meta-analyses representing an aggregated sample of more than 3.6 million participants. Because some primary studies overlapped across reviews, this figure reflects the cumulative rather than the unique number of participants. The results suggest a positive, moderate, and statistically significant relationship between language and mathematics performance (ES = 0.51, z = 19.20, p < .001). To explain the heterogeneity identified among the studies, the study further conducted moderator analysis on various categorical and continuous variables. The findings show that meta-analyses that focus on a specific language skill have larger effect sizes than studies that deal with language in general. The study also determined that the effect sizes differed statistically significantly across the language subgroups. A striking finding is that the relationship of reading, listening, writing, and vocabulary skills with mathematics performance is stronger than that of phonological processing skills. In conclusion, the study highlights the need to redesign mathematics instruction holistically, incorporating practices such as reading/listening comprehension, vocabulary development, and the effective use of mathematical language.