Math phobia, why?

[nightning]

I have selective math phobia. Never found too much interest in fundamental mathematics.

Other science subject were a lot more intuitive for me... so I headed off into that direction. After a while you forget stuff. The process of sitting down and trying to follow/figure things out from textbook again I found to be too time consuming. If you don't have the background, you can't exactly move onto other stuff.

So lack of interest & practice is why I avoid calculus, physics etc... basic statistics though I use on daily basis.

 

[FDG]

I'm not math-scared, but before college I had the same problem as Athenian. In standardized testings (such as equivalents of SAT) I would get very high scores; however, in classroom work the professors would sometimes dislike my approach because I did not write down exactly each step of the reasoning (in stupid homework like dong lots of derivatives-integral, not in proofs, for which I understand the use of being detailed), thus downgrading my marks. Thankfully, after introductory college classes, the attitude has changed quite significantly.

 

[Virtual ghost]

From what I have seen people freak out when they see something like this.

I would dare to say that my knowledge of mathematics is above average.
But I was never interested in fundamental parts. For me it is only a tool.
After all I am into a hard science.


But to be honest if calculation s long I tend to get bored.
For example solving a large matrix which components are small matrices is boring if there is no goal/reason why I am doing it.
But I would not call this phobia.

 

[Thursday]

i knew of someone who had a fear of decimals
damn INTJs

 

[FDG]

From what I have seen people freak out when they see something like this.

Probably even worse when it has to be done with letters. Many people do not mind numbers too much, but become quite confused by the usage of letters (also because they cannot be easily sinthetyzed, so there is more information to care about)

 

[jenocyde]

I was always good at math but never gave it much thought until I started applying it to empirical truths. Chemistry was the subject that opened my brain (and my heart) to my love of mathematics and also to its practical application. I figured out quickly that those who understand these principles can create their own reality. I think the "ENTP as inventor" title really applies to me - as you can see a million working prototypes in my home (as well as a million failed ones...) Nothing gives my pathetic life more pleasure than recreating any item I would buy at the store. Shampoos, body washes, food items - I totally geek out on this stuff. Don't even get me started on physics... I love math, especially when I figure out how I can apply it to something. I appreciate the people who translated these principles for our every day use. It humbles me.

 

[bluebell]

I'm not sure if you could consider me an intelligent person, but I'm somewhat afraid of math. I think it's mostly because of my math teacher early on. She gave me a problem that was accidentally written 3-6 or something, and I answered 0-3. She insisted that there were no numbers less than zero or something, and that convinced me for a long time that math didn't make any sense.

I had a similar experience when I was around 11 or 12, although it didn't turn me off maths. If I know I'm right, I have enough arrogance to strongly argue my case even though usually I'm fairly quiet and respect authority to some degree.

We had the vice principal acting as a substitute teacher (see, it really stuck in my head) who insisted that there were only 360 radii in a circle. Me and another kid tried to convince him that there were in fact an infinite number of radii, but failed. Very annoying at the time.

I've always found maths fairly easy and studied it at college for 3 years. I've forgotten a lot of it now though.

 

[Amargith]

I have a Masters (dunno if you consider that an indication of intelligence but it gives a reference point) and I am unable to do math.

The reason is that I sure can learn it, but I can only retain the information for a couple of days, a week at the most. Sure, the basics are no problem, but anything that's really abstract to me, I cannot retain it. I have the capacity to understand it, but I cannot fully grasp the meaning of it, because in the end...well it's just a bunch of meaningless numbers to me. It is hard to keep track of what represents what and that's when I start mixing formula's and start making gruesome mistakes.

I failed my finals for math and physics in high school, had to redo them. Now, I am fully aware that this was also because I refused to study the first semester, as to me, math and physics were torture. I didn't see the point of studying something I didn't find useful and couldn't retain anyways, and is boring to booth. However, since my finals were in danger in the second semester, I got tutored by my elder brother (industrial engineer), and he's a pretty good teacher actually. He explained me things that my teachers just skimmed over. We made a lot of progress. The next week he came back and wanted to continue and I told him: "Wait...start over. I don't remember squat." His jaw dropped on the floor and he couldn't believe it. But when he tested me, he noticed that although I still had some idea of the main baseline, the 'logic bridges' in between were missing, causing me to make very basic mistakes.

When I finally took the test, my teacher corrected it on the spot (oral exam), and shook his head. I'd flunked, at least on the practical part of the exam. He then tested my knowledge of formula's and the theoretical stuff without having to apply it, and I had it almost flawless (I have a photographic memory). My test on Statistics, which I studied at 5 am in the morning, turned out to be also flawless (again, we only had the basics so it wasn't hard and its less abstract). His jaw dropped to the floor as well. He'd assumed I was just lazy (which was correct), and that with proper studying I'd be fine (which was incorrect). His final words to me were: "You really just do not see it, do you?" I shook my head. I barely passed because of this, but it wasn't enough to make up for the first semester. In the summer, my brother worked with me intensively, and got me passing my tests. A week later, I had no clue anymore what I had answered or why on the tests. It is also the reason taht when I get a mathproblem, or a bunch of numbers, I freeze up. I *know* I will fumble up and get confused. And its a nightmare I personally don't feel like reliving. Oh and btw, it is possible to be haunted by numbers in your dreams!

 

[bluebell]

Interesting post, Amargith. I'm actually the reverse of that. Some of the maths courses I did in college didn't make a huge amount of sense when I was doing them, although I got good grades. But it was kinda like my brain kept mulling over the concepts in the background and 6 months to a year later, I had a much deeper intuitive understanding of previous courses.

This was particularly the case for vector calculus. That said, I never got a particularly good intuitive understanding of differential equations, other than being to grok the answers from seeing patterns. I never managed to develop an inner model that directly related differential equations to real life situations (even though that's what you're supposed to use them for).

 

[Snow Turtle]

Later on, in some (but not all) Algebra classes, I was frustrated because I was expected to "show my work," and find the answer in a particular way, when I saw several ways I could find the answer, and often tended to find the answer in a way that wasn't easy to show in a step-by-step manner. This frustrated me because I couldn't understand why this particular method and showing my work was so important.

For a period of time I loved showing my working out since it meant that I knew how to do the stuff. Then as time went on I gradually did it less and less because it became a chore. However it's pretty useful as it forced me to concentrate on my steps, and when I get things wrong I can look back and see where I made a mistake.

There's nothing worse than spending 10 minutes figuring out an answer, only to realise it's wrong and not know where you went wrong. But that's only true for myself, have you not experienced this problem?

So basically... I don't like math because the people who teach it always ask me to do it in ways that don't make any sense to me. They don't explain why I'm doing anything, they just say that this is how you do it. And I'm not very good at understanding the how without the why. I tend to botch it badly or follow it blindly, never seeing its connection to anything else when it's presented that way.

Sounds like bad teaching. Understand the reasoning behind actions is really important, I hate doing things that I see as pointless as well. Besides connecting the points leads to more efficient understanding and grasping things more quickly.

Regarding myself.
I loved maths until trig identities hit. Then it became a "What the hell am I learning all these things for?" Conversion of tan into sin and cos, double angle rules, cot and everything like that. Occasionally I could see how it was used when finding the area/volume of a trapezium but still it was a pain having to remember all the different conversion methods. Integration and Derivatives were easy until they included trig functions as well.

That was my stumbling block for sure. I also dislikes mechanics for the sheer fact that words confused me. It's obvious that I had problems relating the maths to the words.

 

[Virtual ghost]

Probably even worse when it has to be done with letters. Many people do not mind numbers too much, but become quite confused by the usage of letters (also because they cannot be easily sinthetyzed, so there is more information to care about)

I know.

This is one simple petrogenetic grid.

The letters in this diagram are shortcuts for complex chemical formulas.
If I am not mistaken grt stand for R3 R2 [SiO4]3 for example.

Where first R can stand for Mg, Fe, Mn or Ca
Second R can be Al, Fe, Cr, Ti or Zr
While Si and O form the basic of mineral structure.

The shortcuts are simbols for chemical elements.

 

[Blank]

Spoilers: That was actually Columbus' log for tracking the wind currents.


I dislike math past the practical basic-arithmetic, basic-algebraic forms because it is useless to me, a Japanese and Creative Writing major.

 

[Snow Turtle]

I know.

This is one simple petrogenetic grid.

The letters in this diagram are shortcuts for complex chemical formulas.
If I am not mistaken grt stand for R3 R2 [SiO4]3

Where first R can stand for Mg, Fe, Mn or Ca
Second R can be Al, Fe, Cr, Ti or Zr
While Si and O form the basic of mineral structure.

The shortcuts are simbols for chemical elements.

That's some horrendous graph.
Even the most basic tertiary diagrams give me headaches when they start combining things.

 

[Cimarron]

It seems many people have turned away from mathematics due to teaching that didn't help them in the right way, the way that works for them.

Interesting post, Amargith. I'm actually the reverse of that. Some of the maths courses I did in college didn't make a huge amount of sense when I was doing them, although I got good grades. But it was kinda like my brain kept mulling over the concepts in the background and 6 months to a year later, I had a much deeper intuitive understanding of previous courses.

This was particularly the case for vector calculus. That said, I never got a particularly good intuitive understanding of differential equations, other than being to grok the answers from seeing patterns. I never managed to develop an inner model that directly related differential equations to real life situations (even though that's what you're supposed to use them for).

This sounds a lot like my experience with mathematics. (I don't have a fear or anxiety for it, but I do find it difficult...that's a different topic.)

 

[Lacey]

I'm not afraid of math, I'm...just not very trained in it, I guess. I only took what math classes I had to. I never did higher levels because my interests and talents were more in the humanities, so I took those classes instead. It was a time issue, mostly. When I look back on my education, I think it's one of the things I missed out on. I was never bad at math. I had probably an average aptitude for it, but I worked hard enough to get A's.

I have to say though, I love people who love math.

 

[Fluffywolf]

I love practical math, but it ends there.

Ie. science/chemistry mathematics.

But any of the boring 'you'll probably understand this but it's boring and has no practical use whatsoever' math I usually failed at. Because it just never interested me enough to spend time on.

I want to be able to visualize the math problem in one way or another. (Like Einstein! )

 

[maliafee]

I was good at math until algebra. Either I couldn't learn or had no interest in learning the aspects of it that needed memorization and I got hopelessly lost and behind. I would study though, and even then, when I thought I'd get a B or an A on an upcoming test, I'd end up failing the test. My teacher would be very disappointed in me. I hated math class SO MUCH.

But I'm pretty good at basic math even in my head (multiplying large numbers, etc.)

 

[tibby]

3rd grade, math exam. I'm faced with a question I don't know how to resolve. I panic. A boy (happened to be the one I had a huge crush on) next to me looked at my paper and said: "You're only in the first page? Man you're slow." I broke in tears, he starts apologizing "Hey, I didn't mean it like that... Tibby, look, I'm sorry... Don't cry" Which only made it WORSE. I finished the exam in the library and when I came back and people were being deceivingly nice to me, it hurt so much I buried the shame somewhere deep

I've always been my own worst enemy.

 

[jenocyde]

3rd grade, math exam. I'm faced with a question I don't know how to resolve. I panic. A boy (happened to be the one I had a huge crush on) next to me looked at my paper and said: "You're only in the first page? Man you're slow." I broke in tears, he starts apologizing "Hey, I didn't mean it like that... Tibby, look, I'm sorry... Don't cry" Which only made it WORSE. I finished the exam in the library and when I came back and people were being deceivingly nice to me, it hurt so much I buried the shame somewhere deep

I've always been my own worst enemy.

Wow, is that really what goes on in the NF head?

If someone said that to me, I would have been all 3rd grade arrogant like "Yeah, well your mom's slow!" and maybe would have spit on him. (Hey, anything you do prior to age 10 is fair game...) Then I would have made him eat his words with my big fat A+. Damn, I'm competitive - yikes.

 

[JocktheMotie]

3rd grade, math exam. I'm faced with a question I don't know how to resolve. I panic. A boy (happened to be the one I had a huge crush on) next to me looked at my paper and said: "You're only in the first page? Man you're slow." I broke in tears, he starts apologizing "Hey, I didn't mean it like that... Tibby, look, I'm sorry... Don't cry" Which only made it WORSE. I finished the exam in the library and when I came back and people were being deceivingly nice to me, it hurt so much I buried the shame somewhere deep

I've always been my own worst enemy.

*Note to self, don't comment on peoples' math difficulties/pace*