Abstract

Mathematics is viewed in more abstract form; this makes students dread the subject develop and possess a different level of anxiety toward the subject. The anxiety developed toward the subject lead to poor performance in mathematics. This poor performance in mathematics is affecting a lot of things in society, precisely, the life carrier, scientific and technological development and the development of the Nation. This study investigated the relationship between mathematics anxiety and personality characteristics of secondary school students’ performance in mathematics and their influence on their gender. The study adopted a descriptive design of survey type. Four hundred and forty - six secondary school students were selected from ten secondary school II from one district selected randomly in Lagos state constitutes the sample of the study. Two instruments which include Mathematics Anxiety Inventory and Multi- Dimensional Personality were used in this study. The reliability coefficients of the two instruments with the use of Cronbach Alpha were given respectively as 0.88 and 0.79. Pearson’s Product Moment Analysis, T-test, and Analysis of Variance were used to analyze the data collected. There was a strong, positive correlation between Mathematics Anxiety of students and Multi-Dimensional Personality of students (r=.965, n=446, p=.000). There was no significant relationship between the mathematics anxiety of male and female students, the significant relationship doesn’t exist between the personality characteristics of male and female students. It was discovered in this study that, both mathematics anxiety and personality characteristics had a significant relationship with the age of the students. It was recommended among others that mathematics teachers should teach this subject using different strategies that will make the students active, using real life objects and ICT tools to minimize anxiety in mathematics class.