Areas of the brain associated with fear were engaged in some students and adults when presented with situations involving mathematics.
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This comes as a third of Australian adults and children acknowledged "maths anxiety" that "severely" affected their skills and employment opportunities, a new study has found.
The Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) revealed four-to-five per cent of students had "high levels" of maths anxiety.
Teacher and TopScore Education tutor Colin Turner said anxiety around maths was relatively common among students.
"There's no doubt that early experiences shape a child's ongoing relationship with maths and their level of anxiety or excitement," he said.
"Students who don't feel confident in their maths can be limited in what they perceive they can do in their senior years and this can have a flow-on effect with other science subjects too."
CIS author and professor Dr David Geary said a lack of confidence in skills could disrupt performance and reduce attention otherwise spent on learning or tests.
Dr Geary said parts of the brain associated with fear were engaged in some students tackling maths.
"Brain imaging studies indicate that high levels of mathematics anxiety are associated with strong reactivity of the brain network that underlies acquired or learned fears," he said.
"Thus student reports of mathematics anxiety should be considered realistic appraisals of their apprehension of mathematics."
One-on-one tutoring with adults or peers has been recommended as a potential treatment but there was no "current consensus" on what was most appropriate.
TopScore Education's Mr Turner encouraged families to engage in conversations with classroom teachers and assess whether or not one-on-one tutoring could benefit students.
"It's important children have a positive learning environment," he said.
"Tutoring can allow for a non-judgmental, focused environment that can be playful while also focused."
CIS author Dr Geary said adjustments for learning needed to be made.
"The presence of maths anxiety among Australian students has prompted educators and policymakers to make adjustments in how maths is taught in efforts to accommodate or alleviate maths anxiety," he said.
"This has resulted in calls to reduce the type and format of testing (such as relaxing the timed conditions of maths tests), reducing the emphasis on procedural understanding, and relaxing the apparent inflexibility of requiring 'correct' results to maths problems."
