Anxiety & Timing

My child panics during timed tests but is fine otherwise. What's happening?

It's common enough to have its own research: a child who answers confidently at home struggles exactly when there's a timer. The math isn't the problem. The timer is.

What the research says

Ashcraft and Krause’s research showed that math anxiety specifically hurts performance under time pressure. Not because of a gap in math, but because anxiety takes up the same working memory needed to remember. A later study confirmed the effect is selective: it hits timed tests much harder than untimed ones, because time pressure amplifies anxiety. In children with little anxiety, the difference between timed and untimed tests is tiny; in very anxious children, it’s large.

Research from the SUM project, run by the Universities of Nottingham and Loughborough, points the same way and looks at learning, not just test scores. In their study, a practice game helped children learn their facts whether or not they were pushed to answer quickly. But anxious children learned less under time pressure, and once it was removed, anxiety no longer made a difference to how much they learned. As the researchers put it, time pressure doesn’t necessarily improve accuracy, so a child who doesn’t like speeded practice can practice without it.

The practical takeaway is clear: with an anxious child, removing the visible timer until recall is solid works better than exposing them to it again and again in the hope they’ll get used to it.

What this means in practice

“Fine at home, panics on timed tests” is common and has an explanation; it’s not a mystery. The answer isn’t more timed practice. It’s practicing recall in calm conditions until answers come so fast that time pressure no longer matters.

Try this

If your child is already anxious, don’t recreate timed test conditions at home. Build speed first, then bring in the timer.
When the timer does become useful, use it to describe, not to demand: “that was really fast” instead of “you need to be faster.”
Ask the teacher whether timed tests are coming up, and whether they know about your child’s anxiety. Preparing for the format, not just the content, makes test day calmer.

→ TabTabTab uses a timer only in its timed mode, once speed is already solid. And it tells your child when they're ready for the challenge.

Sources

Ashcraft & Krause (2007) — peer-reviewed study
Pelegrina et al. (2020) — peer-reviewed study
SUM project, Gilmore & Cragg (2025) — expert commentary

Last reviewed: 2026-10-17