If the thought of a math test makes you break out in a cold sweat, Mom or Dad may be partly to blame, according to new research from the University of Chicago.  A team of researchers led by UChicago psychologists Sian Beilock and Susan Levine found that children of math-anxious parents learned less math over the school year and were more likely to be math-anxious themselves—but only when these parents provided frequent help on the child’s math homework. The new study, “Intergenerational Effects of Parents’ Math Anxiety on Children’s Math Achievement and Anxiety,” appears in Psychological Science. Lead author Erin A. Maloney is a postdoctoral scholar in psychology at UChicago. Gerardo Ramirez and Elizabeth A. Gunderson co-authored the article, along with senior authors Levine and Beilock. Previous research from this group has established that when teachers are anxious about math, their students learn less math during the school year. The current study is the first to establish a link between parents’ and children’s math anxiety. These findings suggest that adults’ attitudes toward math can play an important role in children’s math achievement. To read further, please http://news.uchicago.edu/article/2015/08/10/parents-math-anxiety-can-undermine-children-s-math-achievement#sthash.qpH81Mjl.dpuf.