Examination anxiety: A review of interventions and report of a school-based, group intervention by an educational psychology service (EPS)

Abstract

Anxiety about examinations has long been recognised as a pervasive and serious problem (Spielberger, 1980). Combining psychological interventions with the government’s apparent drive to tackle mental health in schools (TES, 2016), this research aims to investigate current exam intervention strategies that are being employed by Educational Psychologists (EPs) in the UK and internationally. It is important to enhance our understanding of how UK EPs are and can be involved in the assessments for children with test anxiety, how they choose to undertake particular assessments and what involvement EPs have in recommending or undertaking interventions for these children and young people. The first paper describes a systematic literature review of international school-based test-anxiety interventions and their effectiveness. The second paper reports a pre-experimental design intervention to explore a school-based test anxiety intervention Beating Exam Anxiety Together (BEAT) developed by educational psychologists and delivered to two secondary schools in the North-West of England by a trainee EP. No comparison group was used, instead a single case was observed at two points: one before the delivery of BEAT and another after the intervention. A mixed methods approach was employed to provide a rich account on how the intervention was delivered. The systematic literature review identified eleven studies as meeting the inclusion criteria, showing a wide range of school-based test anxiety interventions, from different countries, with varying degrees of psychological underpinnings, duration and outcomes. Quantitative data from the experimental study show that 13 out of 14 participants reported a reduction in test anxiety post intervention. Qualitative data support these findings, highlighting that participants feel better equipped to manage their test anxiety levels and feel better prepared to cope in an exam situation. In order to increase the impact of this research, the findings will be disseminated in order to contribute to this knowledge gap, prompt future research, and offer an evidence-based intervention to help schools, EPs and the systems surrounding them to develop their work in reducing test anxiety.

Date of Award	31 Dec 2019
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The University of Manchester
Supervisor	Kevin Woods (Supervisor) & Cathy Atkinson (Supervisor)