Fernan Guido Arana

Oral exams are a threatening situation for students, and avoidance behaviours such as postponement and expression inhibition, are ways of coping with tests anxiety. Present study aims to classify students into profiles based upon their levels of test anxiety and behavioural avoidance and explore differences in cognitive-regulation strategies and skills across the profiles. Participants (N=155) completed self-reports in an online survey. Latent class analysis identified four profiles of students combining levels of test anxiety, expression inhibition, and postponement. Multivariate analysis of variance indicated differences across groups in emotion regulation strategies with catastrophizing and rumination as the most employed in highly test anxious groups, and positive reappraisal in lowest test anxiety groups. In emotion regulation difficulties, the most distressed groups exhibited more deficits to control interference in goal-oriented behaviours, control impulses and emotion acceptance, compared with the remaining groups. Results support inclusion of emotion-regulation training in treatment of oral test anxiety.