Approach orientation promotes movement towards desired end states, whereas avoidance orientation increases movement away from undesired end states

When faced with an aversive situation, individuals differ in how they seek to reduce feelings of stress through coping. Some forms of coping are adaptive and lead to resilience in the face of stress while other forms of coping are maladaptive and may result in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or anxiety disorders (Dymond, 2019; Zoellner et al., 2020). Early work defined coping as involving approach or avoidance coping strategies (Folkman & Lazarus, 1980; Moos & Schaefer, 1984). Approach coping is defined as actively moving towards a stressor in order to seek information, social support, plan ahead, and attempt to solve the problems (Finset et al., 2002). Approach coping can also involve vigilance (Krohne, 1993) in that person deals with stress by increased attention and processing of aversive information. Unlike approach coping, avoidance coping is multidimensional. Avoidance coping has been defined as a passive coping strategy in which an individual disengages from a stressor or as an active coping strategy in which an individual turns away from or seeks to escape from a stressor (Folkman & Lazarus, 1988). Feifel & Strack (1989) also differentiated two similar two aspects of avoidance, avoidance and resignation. In addition, avoidance coping involves cognitive/emotional strategies to reduce thoughts or feelings such as mental disengagement or denial, or behavioral attempts to physically remove one’s self from an aversive situation.