Safety in Numbers: Overcoming Statistics Anxiety in Undergraduate Nursing Students Through Team-Based Learning

Many undergraduate students experience mathematics anxiety in nursing school. This study explored how changing from a curriculum using traditional lecture and test-based pedagogy to a team-based learning approach would affect the relationship between statistics anxiety and statistics self-efficacy in traditional and nontraditional undergraduate nursing students. The student investigator conducted a quasi-experimental mixed-methods study using a control group with a standard statistics curriculum and an intervention group who had a team-based learning statistics curriculum. Students in both groups completed a pre-test/post-test electronic survey on statistics anxiety and statistics self-efficacy. Using a difference-in-difference regression analysis, the student investigator analyzed the quantitative data. The student investigator interviewed the students after the course concluded, providing further qualitative data that the student investigator analyzed using thematic analysis. Ninety-six students completed the Statistics Students Survey, 68 (70.8%) of whom received the intervention curriculum. The student investigator observed a moderate correlation between anxiety and self-efficacy among the students (r = -0.53). The intervention group reported a statistically significant decrease in anxiety compared to students receiving the standard curriculum. However, there was an absence of statistical difference in self-efficacy between the two groups. Fifteen students completed one-on-one interviews, providing evidence that statistics anxiety inversely relate to statistics self-efficacy. Overall, the team-based learning intervention increased self-efficacy and decreased the anxiety of the participants. The results illustrated that team-based learning decreases statistics anxiety in traditional and nontraditional undergraduate nursing students, which provides crucial implications for teaching, attrition levels, and nursing shortages