ABSTRACT
Recently I found myself waiting in a long queue in a university library. When I finally stood opposite the student who was performing check-out service, the young woman stopped and stared for several moments at the title of the top book in the stack I handed her. That text happened to be Buxton’s (1991) Math Panic. ‘That was the best thing about getting out of high school’, she said to me as she looked up. ‘What was?’ I asked. ‘Never having to be involved with math again. Ever!’ I asked about the source of her dislike for mathematics. ‘Who wants to feel stupid all of the time?’ she responded.
