Maths anxiety can leave children dreading lessons that others find routine, and it often wears down motivation as well as marks. Teachers have turned to game-based learning to keep pupils engaged, but most systems give every child the same feedback. A new trial from China suggests that adding an artificial intelligence companion to a maths game can ease anxiety and lift motivation beyond what the game does alone.

Researchers at Universiti Sains Malaysia randomly assigned 174 fifth-grade students in China to one of three groups. The findings appear in BMC Psychology. One group used a gamified maths programme with an AI learning companion, one used the same programme without AI support, and one received traditional lecture-based teaching.

The teaching phase lasted two weeks, and a follow-up test took place four weeks later. Maths anxiety, learning motivation and achievement were measured before the lessons, straight after them, and at the follow-up. Individual students, rather than whole classes, were assigned to the groups.

Maths anxiety is the tension and worry that many people feel when faced with numbers or problem solving. Learning motivation describes how willing a pupil is to engage with a subject, including how much they enjoy it and how capable they feel. Gamification means using points, badges and levels to make learning feel like play.

Students who used the AI-supported programme showed significantly lower maths anxiety and higher motivation than those in either of the other groups. The group differences were large for both outcomes. At the delayed test, the averages kept the same favourable order for the AI group, although the researchers did not formally test the differences between groups at that point.

Achievement told a different story. Both gamified groups outperformed the lecture group, but the AI group did not score significantly higher than the group using the game alone. The extra motivational benefit centred on enjoyment of the task and feeling capable, with no clear difference in effort or in the importance students placed on the work.

The AI companion answered questions by voice or text, and it began with guiding questions rather than handing over answers. If a student kept struggling, it offered clues, then reasoning prompts, and finally a worked example. It also sent encouraging messages when a child made repeated errors or went quiet, and students could pick a scholarly, humorous or adventurous tone.

Tailored encouragement may help children who feel overwhelmed by maths, because it softens the sense of being judged for mistakes. The study has clear limits. It involved one grade in one setting, the follow-up differences were not formally tested, and the team did not measure why the companion helped, so the explanations remain untested. The programme was also tested as a whole package, so no single feature can be credited.

Earlier research has shown that gamified learning can improve motivation and results in primary maths. This trial suggests that the gains in achievement come mainly from the game itself, while an AI companion may add comfort for anxious pupils.