We study linear problems defined on tensor products of Hilbert spaces with an additional (anti-) symmetry property. We construct a linear algorithm that uses finitely many continuous linear functionals and show an explicit formula for its worst case error in terms of the singular values of the univariate problem. Moreover, we show that this algorithm is optimal with respect to a wide class of algorithms and investigate its complexity. We clarify the influence of different (anti-) symmetry conditions on the complexity, compared to the classical unrestricted problem. In particular, for symmetric problems we give characterizations for polynomial tractability and strong polynomial tractability in terms of the amount of the assumed symmetry. Finally, we apply our results to the approximation problem of solutions of the electronic Schr��dinger equation.

Extended version (53 pages); corrected typos, added journal reference