Too many students have ‘reading anxiety’. New research suggests it is triggered by problems in primary school

Western Australian author Hamish Kelly has struggled with reading for almost two decades. In his first of two books, he describes his experience of learning to read:

The letters in words were confusing and words often looked the same […] Each year it got harder. Reading got harder and maths got twice as hard, as maths has lots of reading as well […] By year 5, I was down on myself. I felt stupid and dumb!! My Mum, Dad, and teachers told me I wasn’t, but I still felt that I was. There [were] other challenges […] like anxiety and loss of confidence.

What Hamish is describing is reading anxiety. This involves excessive worries and apprehensions about reading activities.

In the last eight years, there has been a five-fold increase in studies of reading anxiety, as we learn more about this educational challenge.

One of the things we are trying to work out is if reading difficulties cause reading anxiety or if reading anxiety causes reading difficulties.

A new longitudinal study provides some clues.

Read more: Some kids with reading difficulties can also have reading anxiety – what can parents do?

What causes what?

The results of this study, published in the Journal of Educational Psychology, support the former idea – that reading ability can cause reading anxiety.

This study tested 499 Bulgarian children’s reading ability eight times between grades 1 and 8. Most of these children (294) were also tested for their reading anxiety in grade 8.

The researchers also considered other factors such as socioeconomic status, working memory (the ability to temporarily hold and manipulate information) and IQ scores.

The study found children’s reading in grade 1, as well as their reading gains between grades 1 and 3, and between grades 6 and 8, predicted reading anxiety in grade 8. This suggests problems with reading at any time in primary school might cause reading anxiety in children.

This findings align with a study from Finland, published earlier this year.

Here, researchers found poorer reading skills in grade 1 students predicted higher reading anxiety in grade 2.

Why this is an issue for students?

Together, these findings support the idea that reading ability and reading anxiety may form a vicious cycle.

For many students – such as Hamish – this cycle begins when they start struggling with learning to read and can see they are behind their peers. This triggers the belief they are bad reader (or a poor reading self-concept) which makes them worry about reading, particularly in front of other people (reading anxiety).

To avoid these anxious feelings, they start to avoid reading the best they can – perhaps by school refusal or by not paying attention during reading classes (reading disengagment).

This reduces their reading learning, which further harms their reading self-concept, anxiety levels and reading engagement.

So a vicious cycle is created that maintains difficulties with both reading ability and reading anxiety.

How many students are affected?

A limitation of the Bulgarian study is it did not explore how many children with reading difficulties have reading anxiety. In fact, very few studies do. Two exceptions – both Australian studies – have estimated around 50% of children with reading challenges have reading anxiety.

Given about one-third of Australian students do not meet basic standards in literacy – as measured by NAPLAN testing – this suggests a significant number would also would struggle with reading anxiety.

What does this all mean for teachers, families and friends?

The authors of the Bulgarian study noted they did not measure the impact that teachers, families, and peers may have on reading anxiety.

This is important because other research suggests support from these networks may help “break” or moderate the relationship between reading ability and reading anxiety.

For example, teachers, families, and friends can help by adopting a neurodiversity approach that promotes awareness of, and respect for, differences between students’ ability to learn all cognitive skills. This includes reading.

This might mean parents and grandparents do not make a fuss if a child is not learning to read as quickly as their siblings or friends (and avoid comparisons such as, “Max could read when he was in kindy!”). Instead, make a fuss about something a child is good at (for example, “Wow – you are definitely the best cook/swimmer/artist in the family!”).

They can also encourage students who have reading challenges to develop a “growth mindset”. This focuses on progress and the development of competence rather than absolute levels of achievement. For example, celebrating how a child can reliably read simple sentences when they could only read standalone words six months ago, rather than whether they are “reading at Year 1 level”.

Both approaches can help support a student’s confidence, which can help their reading anxiety and reading disengagement. The more they read, they better they become, the more they will enjoy and engage with reading. And then in turn, the more they will read and the more they will improve.