problem solving and coping

5 Effective Problem-Solving Strategies

Got a problem you’re trying to solve? Strategies like trial and error, gut instincts, and “working backward” can help. We look at some examples and how to use them.

We all face problems daily. Some are simple, like deciding what to eat for dinner. Others are more complex, like resolving a conflict with a loved one or figuring out how to overcome barriers to your goals.

No matter what problem you’re facing, these five problem-solving strategies can help you develop an effective solution.

What are problem-solving strategies?

To effectively solve a problem, you need a problem-solving strategy .

If you’ve had to make a hard decision before then you know that simply ruminating on the problem isn’t likely to get you anywhere. You need an effective strategy — or a plan of action — to find a solution.

In general, effective problem-solving strategies include the following steps:

• Define the problem.
• Come up with alternative solutions.
• Decide on a solution.
• Implement the solution.

Problem-solving strategies don’t guarantee a solution, but they do help guide you through the process of finding a resolution.

Using problem-solving strategies also has other benefits . For example, having a strategy you can turn to can help you overcome anxiety and distress when you’re first faced with a problem or difficult decision.

The key is to find a problem-solving strategy that works for your specific situation, as well as your personality. One strategy may work well for one type of problem but not another. In addition, some people may prefer certain strategies over others; for example, creative people may prefer to depend on their insights than use algorithms.

It’s important to be equipped with several problem-solving strategies so you use the one that’s most effective for your current situation.

1. Trial and error

One of the most common problem-solving strategies is trial and error. In other words, you try different solutions until you find one that works.

For example, say the problem is that your Wi-Fi isn’t working. You might try different things until it starts working again, like restarting your modem or your devices until you find or resolve the problem. When one solution isn’t successful, you try another until you find what works.

Trial and error can also work for interpersonal problems . For example, if your child always stays up past their bedtime, you might try different solutions — a visual clock to remind them of the time, a reward system, or gentle punishments — to find a solution that works.

2. Heuristics

Sometimes, it’s more effective to solve a problem based on a formula than to try different solutions blindly.

Heuristics are problem-solving strategies or frameworks people use to quickly find an approximate solution. It may not be the optimal solution, but it’s faster than finding the perfect resolution, and it’s “good enough.”

Algorithms or equations are examples of heuristics.

An algorithm is a step-by-step problem-solving strategy based on a formula guaranteed to give you positive results. For example, you might use an algorithm to determine how much food is needed to feed people at a large party.

However, many life problems have no formulaic solution; for example, you may not be able to come up with an algorithm to solve the problem of making amends with your spouse after a fight.

3. Gut instincts (insight problem-solving)

While algorithm-based problem-solving is formulaic, insight problem-solving is the opposite.

When we use insight as a problem-solving strategy we depend on our “gut instincts” or what we know and feel about a situation to come up with a solution. People might describe insight-based solutions to problems as an “aha moment.”

For example, you might face the problem of whether or not to stay in a relationship. The solution to this problem may come as a sudden insight that you need to leave. In insight problem-solving, the cognitive processes that help you solve a problem happen outside your conscious awareness.

4. Working backward

Working backward is a problem-solving approach often taught to help students solve problems in mathematics. However, it’s useful for real-world problems as well.

Working backward is when you start with the solution and “work backward” to figure out how you got to the solution. For example, if you know you need to be at a party by 8 p.m., you might work backward to problem-solve when you must leave the house, when you need to start getting ready, and so on.

5. Means-end analysis

Means-end analysis is a problem-solving strategy that, to put it simply, helps you get from “point A” to “point B” by examining and coming up with solutions to obstacles.

When using means-end analysis you define the current state or situation (where you are now) and the intended goal. Then, you come up with solutions to get from where you are now to where you need to be.

For example, a student might be faced with the problem of how to successfully get through finals season . They haven’t started studying, but their end goal is to pass all of their finals. Using means-end analysis, the student can examine the obstacles that stand between their current state and their end goal (passing their finals).

They could see, for example, that one obstacle is that they get distracted from studying by their friends. They could devise a solution to this obstacle by putting their phone on “do not disturb” mode while studying.

Let’s recap

Whether they’re simple or complex, we’re faced with problems every day. To successfully solve these problems we need an effective strategy. There are many different problem-solving strategies to choose from.

Although problem-solving strategies don’t guarantee a solution, they can help you feel less anxious about problems and make it more likely that you come up with an answer.

Last medically reviewed on November 1, 2022

8 sources collapsed

• Chu Y, et al. (2011). Human performance on insight problem-solving: A review. https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1094&context=jps
• Dumper K, et al. (n.d.) Chapter 7.3: Problem-solving in introductory psychology. https://opentext.wsu.edu/psych105/chapter/7-4-problem-solving/
• Foulds LR. (2017). The heuristic problem-solving approach. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1057/jors.1983.205
• Gick ML. (1986). Problem-solving strategies. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00461520.1986.9653026
• Montgomery ME. (2015). Problem solving using means-end analysis. https://sites.psu.edu/psych256sp15/2015/04/19/problem-solving-using-means-end-analysis/
• Posamentier A, et al. (2015). Problem-solving strategies in mathematics. Chapter 3: Working backwards. https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/10.1142/9789814651646_0003
• Sarathy V. (2018). Real world problem-solving. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00261/full
• Woods D. (2000). An evidence-based strategy for problem solving. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/245332888_An_Evidence-Based_Strategy_for_Problem_Solving

Read this next

Making big decisions can be a difficult task. Setting deadlines and asking for support can help you confidently move ahead.

Dealing with a problem can fee a lot more manageable when you have a plan. Try these 5 steps for becoming a better problem-solver.

A lack of communication in relationships doesn't have to be a dealbreaker. Learn how to improve your communication skills at work and at home.

Sleep deprivation, stress, or underlying health conditions can lead to an inability to focus. Self-help techniques can help improve your concentration.

Positive thinking is an essential practice to improve your overall health and well-being. Discover how to incorporate positive thinking into your…

Dreaming about babies can hold different meanings for everyone. Although theories vary, biological and psychological factors may influence your dreams.

If you're seeking to boost your concentration, practicing mindfulness, chewing gum, and brain games are just a few techniques to try. Learn how they…

Creating a schedule and managing stress are ways to make your days go by faster. Changing your perception of time can also improve your overall…

Experiencing unwanted and difficult memories can be challenging. But learning how to replace negative memories with positive ones may help you cope.

Engaging in brain exercises, like sudoku puzzles and learning new languages, enhances cognitive abilities and improves overall well-being.

Self-Esteem

It’s ok you can’t solve every problem, trying to “fix" everything can leave you feeling like a failure..

Updated May 10, 2024 | Reviewed by Ray Parker

• What Is Self-Esteem?
• Find a therapist near me
• Your intrinsic value is more than what you can do for other people.

You are still worthwhile and can be successful, even if you don’t have all the solutions.

• Consider which decision will make you feel you’ve stayed true to your values.

In coaching others, I often discuss problem-solving strategies to help individuals think creatively and consider many options when they are faced with challenging situations.

Problem solving 1-2 includes the following:

• Define the problem, identify obstacles, and set realistic goals .
• Generate a variety of alternative solutions to overcome obstacles identified.
• Choose which idea has the highest likelihood to achieve the goal.
• Try out the solution in real-life and see if it worked or not.

Problem-solving strategies can be helpful in many situations. Thinking creatively and testing out different potential solutions can help you come up with alternative ways of solving your problems.

While many problems can be solved, there are also situations in which there is no “perfect” solution or in which what seems to be the best solution still leaves you feeling unsatisfied or like you’re not doing enough.

I encourage you to increase your comfort around the following three truths:

1. You can’t always solve everyone else’s problems.

2. You can’t always solve all of your own problems.

3. You are not a failure if you can’t solve every problem.

You can’t always solve everyone else’s problems.

When someone around you needs help, do you feel compelled to find solutions to their problem?

Are you seen as the problem solver at your job or in your close relationships?

Does it feel uncomfortable for you to listen to someone tell you about a problem and not offer solutions?

There are times when others come to you because they know you can help them solve a problem. There are also times when the other person is coming to you not for a solution to their problem, but for support, empathy, and a listening ear.

Your relationships may be negatively impacted if others feel that you don’t fully listen and only try to “fix” everything for them. While this may feel like a noble act, it may lead the other person to feel like they have failed or that you think they are unable to solve their own problems.

Consider approaching such situations with curiosity by saying to the other person:

• As you share this information with me, tell me how I can best support you.
• What would be most helpful right now? Are you looking for an empathetic ear or want to brainstorm potential next steps?
• I want to be sure I am as helpful as I can be right now; what are you hoping to get out of our conversation?

You can’t always solve all of your own problems.

We are taught from a young age that problems have a solution. For example, while solving word problems in math class may not have been your favorite thing to do, you knew there was ultimately a “right” answer. Many times, the real world is much more complex, and many of the problems that you face do not have clear or “right” answers.

You may often be faced with finding solutions that do the most good for the most amount of people, but you know that others may still be left out or feel unsatisfied with the result.

Your beliefs about yourself, other people, and the world can sometimes help you make decisions in such circumstances. You may ask for help from others. Some may consider their faith or spirituality for guidance. While others may consider philosophical theories.

Knowing that there often isn’t a “perfect” solution, you may consider asking yourself some of the following questions:

• What’s the healthiest decision I can make? The healthiest decision for yourself and for those who will be impacted.
• Imagine yourself 10 years in the future, looking back on the situation: What do you think the future-you would encourage you to do?
• What would a wise person do?
• What decision will allow you to feel like you’ve stayed true to your values?

You are not a failure if you can’t solve all of the problems.

If you have internalized feeling like you need to be able to solve every problem that comes across your path, you may feel like a failure each time you don’t.

It’s impossible to solve every problem.

Your intrinsic value is more than what you can do for other people. You have value because you are you.

Consider creating more realistic and adaptive thoughts around your ability to help others and solve problems.

Some examples include:

• I am capable, even without solving all of the problems.
• I am worthwhile, even if I’m not perfect.
• What I do for others does not define my worth.
• In living my values, I know I’ve done my best.

I hope you utilize the information above to consider how you can coach yourself the next time you:

• Start to solve someone else’s problem without being asked.
• Feel stuck in deciding the best next steps.
• Judge yourself negatively.

1. D'zurilla, T. J., & Goldfried, M. R. (1971). Problem solving and behavior modification. Journal of abnormal psychology, 78(1), 107.

2. D’Zurilla, T. J., & Nezu, A. M. (2010). Problem-solving therapy. Handbook of cognitive-behavioral therapies, 3(1), 197-225.

Julie Radico, Psy.D. ABPP, is a board-certified clinical psychologist and coauthor of You Will Get Through This: A Mental Health First-Aid Kit.

• Find a Therapist
• Find a Treatment Center
• Find a Psychiatrist
• Find a Support Group
• Find Online Therapy
• United States
• Brooklyn, NY
• Chicago, IL
• Houston, TX
• Los Angeles, CA
• New York, NY
• Portland, OR
• San Diego, CA
• San Francisco, CA
• Seattle, WA
• Washington, DC
• Asperger's
• Bipolar Disorder
• Chronic Pain
• Eating Disorders
• Passive Aggression
• Personality
• Goal Setting
• Positive Psychology
• Stopping Smoking
• Low Sexual Desire
• Relationships
• Child Development
• Self Tests NEW
• Therapy Center
• Diagnosis Dictionary
• Types of Therapy

At any moment, someone’s aggravating behavior or our own bad luck can set us off on an emotional spiral that threatens to derail our entire day. Here’s how we can face our triggers with less reactivity so that we can get on with our lives.

• Emotional Intelligence
• Gaslighting
• Affective Forecasting
• Neuroscience

• Tools and Resources
• Customer Services
• Affective Science
• Biological Foundations of Psychology
• Clinical Psychology: Disorders and Therapies
• Cognitive Psychology/Neuroscience
• Developmental Psychology
• Educational/School Psychology
• Forensic Psychology
• Health Psychology
• History and Systems of Psychology
• Individual Differences
• Methods and Approaches in Psychology
• Neuropsychology
• Organizational and Institutional Psychology
• Personality
• Psychology and Other Disciplines
• Social Psychology
• Sports Psychology
• Share This Facebook LinkedIn Twitter

Article contents

Work, stress, coping, and stress management.

• Sharon Glazer Sharon Glazer University of Baltimore
•  and  Cong Liu Cong Liu Hofstra University
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190236557.013.30
• Published online: 26 April 2017

Work stress refers to the process of job stressors, or stimuli in the workplace, leading to strains, or negative responses or reactions. Organizational development refers to a process in which problems or opportunities in the work environment are identified, plans are made to remediate or capitalize on the stimuli, action is taken, and subsequently the results of the plans and actions are evaluated. When organizational development strategies are used to assess work stress in the workplace, the actions employed are various stress management interventions. Two key factors tying work stress and organizational development are the role of the person and the role of the environment. In order to cope with work-related stressors and manage strains, organizations must be able to identify and differentiate between factors in the environment that are potential sources of stressors and how individuals perceive those factors. Primary stress management interventions focus on preventing stressors from even presenting, such as by clearly articulating workers’ roles and providing necessary resources for employees to perform their job. Secondary stress management interventions focus on a person’s appraisal of job stressors as a threat or challenge, and the person’s ability to cope with the stressors (presuming sufficient internal resources, such as a sense of meaningfulness in life, or external resources, such as social support from a supervisor). When coping is not successful, strains may develop. Tertiary stress management interventions attempt to remediate strains, by addressing the consequence itself (e.g., diabetes management) and/or the source of the strain (e.g., reducing workload). The person and/or the organization may be the targets of the intervention. The ultimate goal of stress management interventions is to minimize problems in the work environment, intensify aspects of the work environment that create a sense of a quality work context, enable people to cope with stressors that might arise, and provide tools for employees and organizations to manage strains that might develop despite all best efforts to create a healthy workplace.

• stress management
• organization development
• organizational interventions
• stress theories and frameworks

Introduction

Work stress is a generic term that refers to work-related stimuli (aka job stressors) that may lead to physical, behavioral, or psychological consequences (i.e., strains) that affect both the health and well-being of the employee and the organization. Not all stressors lead to strains, but all strains are a result of stressors, actual or perceived. Common terms often used interchangeably with work stress are occupational stress, job stress, and work-related stress. Terms used interchangeably with job stressors include work stressors, and as the specificity of the type of stressor might include psychosocial stressor (referring to the psychological experience of work demands that have a social component, e.g., conflict between two people; Hauke, Flintrop, Brun, & Rugulies, 2011 ), hindrance stressor (i.e., a stressor that prevents goal attainment; Cavanaugh, Boswell, Roehling, & Boudreau, 2000 ), and challenge stressor (i.e., a stressor that is difficult, but attainable and possibly rewarding to attain; Cavanaugh et al., 2000 ).

Stress in the workplace continues to be a highly pervasive problem, having both direct negative effects on individuals experiencing it and companies paying for it, and indirect costs vis à vis lost productivity (Dopkeen & DuBois, 2014 ). For example, U.K. public civil servants’ work-related stress rose from 10.8% in 2006 to 22.4% in 2013 and about one-third of the workforce has taken more than 20 days of leave due to stress-related ill-health, while well over 50% are present at work when ill (French, 2015 ). These findings are consistent with a report by the International Labor Organization (ILO, 2012 ), whereby 50% to 60% of all workdays are lost due to absence attributed to factors associated with work stress.

The prevalence of work-related stress is not diminishing despite improvements in technology and employment rates. The sources of stress, such as workload, seem to exacerbate with improvements in technology (Coovert & Thompson, 2003 ). Moreover, accessibility through mobile technology and virtual computer terminals is linking people to their work more than ever before (ILO, 2012 ; Tarafdar, Tu, Ragu-Nathan, & Ragu-Nathan, 2007 ). Evidence of this kind of mobility and flexibility is further reinforced in a June 2007 survey of 4,025 email users (over 13 years of age); AOL reported that four in ten survey respondents reported planning their vacations around email accessibility and 83% checked their emails at least once a day while away (McMahon, 2007 ). Ironically, despite these mounting work-related stressors and clear financial and performance outcomes, some individuals are reporting they are less “stressed,” but only because “stress has become the new normal” (Jayson, 2012 , para. 4).

This new normal is likely the source of psychological and physiological illness. Siegrist ( 2010 ) contends that conditions in the workplace, particularly psychosocial stressors that are perceived as unfavorable relationships with others and self, and an increasingly sedentary lifestyle (reinforced with desk jobs) are increasingly contributing to cardiovascular disease. These factors together justify a need to continue on the path of helping individuals recognize and cope with deleterious stressors in the work environment and, equally important, to find ways to help organizations prevent harmful stressors over which they have control, as well as implement policies or mechanisms to help employees deal with these stressors and subsequent strains. Along with a greater focus on mitigating environmental constraints are interventions that can be used to prevent anxiety, poor attitudes toward the workplace conditions and arrangements, and subsequent cardiovascular illness, absenteeism, and poor job performance (Siegrist, 2010 ).

Even the ILO has presented guidance on how the workplace can help prevent harmful job stressors (aka hindrance stressors) or at least help workers cope with them. Consistent with the view that well-being is not the absence of stressors or strains and with the view that positive psychology offers a lens for proactively preventing stressors, the ILO promotes increasing preventative risk assessments, interventions to prevent and control stressors, transparent organizational communication, worker involvement in decision-making, networks and mechanisms for workplace social support, awareness of how working and living conditions interact, safety, health, and well-being in the organization (ILO, n.d. ). The field of industrial and organizational (IO) psychology supports the ILO’s recommendations.

IO psychology views work stress as the process of a person’s interaction with multiple aspects of the work environment, job design, and work conditions in the organization. Interventions to manage work stress, therefore, focus on the psychosocial factors of the person and his or her relationships with others and the socio-technical factors related to the work environment and work processes. Viewing work stress from the lens of the person and the environment stems from Kurt Lewin’s ( 1936 ) work that stipulates a person’s state of mental health and behaviors are a function of the person within a specific environment or situation. Aspects of the work environment that affect individuals’ mental states and behaviors include organizational hierarchy, organizational climate (including processes, policies, practices, and reward structures), resources to support a person’s ability to fulfill job duties, and management structure (including leadership). Job design refers to each contributor’s tasks and responsibilities for fulfilling goals associated with the work role. Finally, working conditions refers not only to the physical environment, but also the interpersonal relationships with other contributors.

Each of the conditions that are identified in the work environment may be perceived as potentially harmful or a threat to the person or as an opportunity. When a stressor is perceived as a threat to attaining desired goals or outcomes, the stressor may be labeled as a hindrance stressor (e.g., LePine, Podsakoff, & Lepine, 2005 ). When the stressor is perceived as an opportunity to attain a desired goal or end state, it may be labeled as a challenge stressor. According to LePine and colleagues’ ( 2005 ), both challenge (e.g., time urgency, workload) and hindrance (e.g., hassles, role ambiguity, role conflict) stressors could lead to strains (as measured by “anxiety, depersonalization, depression, emotional exhaustion, frustration, health complaints, hostility, illness, physical symptoms, and tension” [p. 767]). However, challenge stressors positively relate with motivation and performance, whereas hindrance stressors negatively relate with motivation and performance. Moreover, motivation and strains partially mediate the relationship between hindrance and challenge stressors with performance.

Figure 1. Organizational development frameworks to guide identification of work stress and interventions.

In order to (1) minimize any potential negative effects from stressors, (2) increase coping skills to deal with stressors, or (3) manage strains, organizational practitioners or consultants will devise organizational interventions geared toward prevention, coping, and/or stress management. Ultimately, toxic factors in the work environment can have deleterious effects on a person’s physical and psychological well-being, as well as on an organization’s total health. It behooves management to take stock of the organization’s health, which includes the health and well-being of its employees, if the organization wishes to thrive and be profitable. According to Page and Vella-Brodrick’s ( 2009 ) model of employee well-being, employee well-being results from subjective well-being (i.e., life satisfaction and general positive or negative affect), workplace well-being (composed of job satisfaction and work-specific positive or negative affect), and psychological well-being (e.g., self-acceptance, positive social relations, mastery, purpose in life). Job stressors that become unbearable are likely to negatively affect workplace well-being and thus overall employee well-being. Because work stress is a major organizational pain point and organizations often employ organizational consultants to help identify and remediate pain points, the focus here is on organizational development (OD) frameworks; several work stress frameworks are presented that together signal areas where organizations might focus efforts for change in employee behaviors, attitudes, and performance, as well as the organization’s performance and climate. Work stress, interventions, and several OD and stress frameworks are depicted in Figure 1 .

The goals are: (1) to conceptually define and clarify terms associated with stress and stress management, particularly focusing on organizational factors that contribute to stress and stress management, and (2) to present research that informs current knowledge and practices on workplace stress management strategies. Stressors and strains will be defined, leading OD and work stress frameworks that are used to organize and help organizations make sense of the work environment and the organization’s responsibility in stress management will be explored, and stress management will be explained as an overarching thematic label; an area of study and practice that focuses on prevention (primary) interventions, coping (secondary) interventions, and managing strains (tertiary) interventions; as well as the label typically used to denote tertiary interventions. Suggestions for future research and implications toward becoming a healthy organization are presented.

Defining Stressors and Strains

Work-related stressors or job stressors can lead to different kinds of strains individuals and organizations might experience. Various types of stress management interventions, guided by OD and work stress frameworks, may be employed to prevent or cope with job stressors and manage strains that develop(ed).

A job stressor is a stimulus external to an employee and a result of an employee’s work conditions. Example job stressors include organizational constraints, workplace mistreatments (such as abusive supervision, workplace ostracism, incivility, bullying), role stressors, workload, work-family conflicts, errors or mistakes, examinations and evaluations, and lack of structure (Jex & Beehr, 1991 ; Liu, Spector, & Shi, 2007 ; Narayanan, Menon, & Spector, 1999 ). Although stressors may be categorized as hindrances and challenges, there is not yet sufficient information to be able to propose which stress management interventions would better serve to reduce those hindrance stressors or to reduce strain-producing challenge stressors while reinforcing engagement-producing challenge stressors.

Organizational Constraints

Organizational constraints may be hindrance stressors as they prevent employees from translating their motivation and ability into high-level job performance (Peters & O’Connor, 1980 ). Peters and O’Connor ( 1988 ) defined 11 categories of organizational constraints: (1) job-related information, (2) budgetary support, (3) required support, (4) materials and supplies, (5) required services and help from others, (6) task preparation, (7) time availability, (8) the work environment, (9) scheduling of activities, (10) transportation, and (11) job-relevant authority. The inhibiting effect of organizational constraints may be due to the lack of, inadequacy of, or poor quality of these categories.

Workplace Mistreatment

Workplace mistreatment presents a cluster of interpersonal variables, such as interpersonal conflict, bullying, incivility, and workplace ostracism (Hershcovis, 2011 ; Tepper & Henle, 2011 ). Typical workplace mistreatment behaviors include gossiping, rude comments, showing favoritism, yelling, lying, and ignoring other people at work (Tepper & Henle, 2011 ). These variables relate to employees’ psychological well-being, physical well-being, work attitudes (e.g., job satisfaction and organizational commitment), and turnover intention (e.g., Hershcovis, 2011 ; Spector & Jex, 1998 ). Some researchers differentiated the source of mistreatment, such as mistreatment from one’s supervisor versus mistreatment from one’s coworker (e.g., Bruk-Lee & Spector, 2006 ; Frone, 2000 ; Liu, Liu, Spector, & Shi, 2011 ).

Role Stressors

Role stressors are demands, constraints, or opportunities a person perceives to be associated, and thus expected, with his or her work role(s) across various situations. Three commonly studied role stressors are role ambiguity, role conflict, and role overload (Glazer & Beehr, 2005 ; Kahn, Wolfe, Quinn, Snoek, & Rosenthal, 1964 ). Role ambiguity in the workplace occurs when an employee lacks clarity regarding what performance-related behaviors are expected of him or her. Role conflict refers to situations wherein an employee receives incompatible role requests from the same or different supervisors or the employee is asked to engage in work that impedes his or her performance in other work or nonwork roles or clashes with his or her values. Role overload refers to excessive demands and insufficient time (quantitative) or knowledge (qualitative) to complete the work. The construct is often used interchangeably with workload, though role overload focuses more on perceived expectations from others about one’s workload. These role stressors significantly relate to low job satisfaction, low organizational commitment, low job performance, high tension or anxiety, and high turnover intention (Abramis, 1994 ; Glazer & Beehr, 2005 ; Jackson & Schuler, 1985 ).

Excessive workload is one of the most salient stressors at work (e.g., Liu et al., 2007 ). There are two types of workload: quantitative and qualitative workload (LaRocco, Tetrick, & Meder, 1989 ; Parasuraman & Purohit, 2000 ). Quantitative workload refers to the excessive amount of work one has. In a summary of a Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development Report from 2006 , Dewe and Kompier ( 2008 ) noted that quantitative workload was one of the top three stressors workers experienced at work. Qualitative workload refers to the difficulty of work. Workload also differs by the type of the load. There are mental workload and physical workload (Dwyer & Ganster, 1991 ). Excessive physical workload may result in physical discomfort or illness. Excessive mental workload will cause psychological distress such as anxiety or frustration (Bowling & Kirkendall, 2012 ). Another factor affecting quantitative workload is interruptions (during the workday). Lin, Kain, and Fritz ( 2013 ) found that interruptions delay completion of job tasks, thus adding to the perception of workload.

Work-Family Conflict

Work-family conflict is a form of inter-role conflict in which demands from one’s work domain and one’s family domain are incompatible to some extent (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985 ). Work can interfere with family (WIF) and/or family can interfere with work (FIW) due to time-related commitments to participating in one domain or another, incompatible behavioral expectations, or when strains in one domain carry over to the other (Greenhaus & Beutell, 1985 ). Work-family conflict significantly relates to work-related outcomes (e.g., job satisfaction, organizational commitment, turnover intention, burnout, absenteeism, job performance, job strains, career satisfaction, and organizational citizenship behaviors), family-related outcomes (e.g., marital satisfaction, family satisfaction, family-related performance, family-related strains), and domain-unspecific outcomes (e.g., life satisfaction, psychological strain, somatic or physical symptoms, depression, substance use or abuse, and anxiety; Amstad, Meier, Fasel, Elfering, & Semmer, 2011 ).

Individuals and organizations can experience work-related strains. Sometimes organizations will experience strains through the employee’s negative attitudes or strains, such as that a worker’s absence might yield lower production rates, which would roll up into an organizational metric of organizational performance. In the industrial and organizational (IO) psychology literature, organizational strains are mostly observed as macro-level indicators, such as health insurance costs, accident-free days, and pervasive problems with company morale. In contrast, individual strains, usually referred to as job strains, are internal to an employee. They are responses to work conditions and relate to health and well-being of employees. In other words, “job strains are adverse reactions employees have to job stressors” (Spector, Chen, & O’Connell, 2000 , p. 211). Job strains tend to fall into three categories: behavioral, physical, and psychological (Jex & Beehr, 1991 ).

Behavioral strains consist of actions that employees take in response to job stressors. Examples of behavioral strains include employees drinking alcohol in the workplace or intentionally calling in sick when they are not ill (Spector et al., 2000 ). Physical strains consist of health symptoms that are physiological in nature that employees contract in response to job stressors. Headaches and ulcers are examples of physical strains. Lastly, psychological strains are emotional reactions and attitudes that employees have in response to job stressors. Examples of psychological strains are job dissatisfaction, anxiety, and frustration (Spector et al., 2000 ). Interestingly, research studies that utilize self-report measures find that most job strains experienced by employees tend to be psychological strains (Spector et al., 2000 ).

Leading Frameworks

Organizations that are keen on identifying organizational pain points and remedying them through organizational campaigns or initiatives often discover the pain points are rooted in work-related stressors and strains and the initiatives have to focus on reducing workers’ stress and increasing a company’s profitability. Through organizational climate surveys, for example, companies discover that aspects of the organization’s environment, including its policies, practices, reward structures, procedures, and processes, as well as employees at all levels of the company, are contributing to the individual and organizational stress. Recent studies have even begun to examine team climates for eustress and distress assessed in terms of team members’ homogenous psychological experience of vigor, efficacy, dedication, and cynicism (e.g., Kożusznik, Rodriguez, & Peiro, 2015 ).

Each of the frameworks presented advances different aspects that need to be identified in order to understand the source and potential remedy for stressors and strains. In some models, the focus is on resources, in others on the interaction of the person and environment, and in still others on the role of the person in the workplace. Few frameworks directly examine the role of the organization, but the organization could use these frameworks to plan interventions that would minimize stressors, cope with existing stressors, and prevent and/or manage strains. One of the leading frameworks in work stress research that is used to guide organizational interventions is the person and environment (P-E) fit (French & Caplan, 1972 ). Its precursor is the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research’s (ISR) role stress model (Kahn, Wolfe, Quinn, Snoek, & Rosenthal, 1964 ) and Lewin’s Field Theory. Several other theories have since evolved from the P-E fit framework, including Karasek and Theorell’s ( 1990 ), Karasek ( 1979 ) Job Demands-Control Model (JD-C), the transactional framework (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984 ), Conservation of Resources (COR) theory (Hobfoll, 1989 ), and Siegrist’s ( 1996 ) Effort-Reward Imbalance (ERI) Model.

Field Theory

The premise of Kahn et al.’s ( 1964 ) role stress theory is Lewin’s ( 1997 ) Field Theory. Lewin purported that behavior and mental events are a dynamic function of the whole person, including a person’s beliefs, values, abilities, needs, thoughts, and feelings, within a given situation (field or environment), as well as the way a person represents his or her understanding of the field and behaves in that space. Lewin explains that work-related strains are a result of individuals’ subjective perceptions of objective factors, such as work roles, relationships with others in the workplace, as well as personality indicators, and can be used to predict people’s reactions, including illness. Thus, to make changes to an organizational system, it is necessary to understand a field and try to move that field from the current state to the desired state. Making this move necessitates identifying mechanisms influencing individuals.

Role Stress Theory

Role stress theory mostly isolates the perspective a person has about his or her work-related responsibilities and expectations to determine how those perceptions relate with a person’s work-related strains. However, those relationships have been met with somewhat varied results, which Glazer and Beehr ( 2005 ) concluded might be a function of differences in culture, an environmental factor often neglected in research. Kahn et al.’s ( 1964 ) role stress theory, coupled with Lewin’s ( 1936 ) Field Theory, serves as the foundation for the P-E fit theory. Lewin ( 1936 ) wrote, “Every psychological event depends upon the state of the person and at the same time on the environment” (p. 12). Researchers of IO psychology have narrowed the environment to the organization or work team. This narrowed view of the organizational environment is evident in French and Caplan’s ( 1972 ) P-E fit framework.

Person-Environment Fit Theory

The P-E fit framework focuses on the extent to which there is congruence between the person and a given environment, such as the organization (Caplan, 1987 ; Edwards, 2008 ). For example, does the person have the necessary skills and abilities to fulfill an organization’s demands, or does the environment support a person’s desire for autonomy (i.e., do the values align?) or fulfill a person’s needs (i.e., a person’s needs are rewarded). Theoretically and empirically, the greater the person-organization fit, the greater a person’s job satisfaction and organizational commitment, the less a person’s turnover intention and work-related stress (see meta-analyses by Assouline & Meir, 1987 ; Kristof-Brown, Zimmerman, & Johnson, 2005 ; Verquer, Beehr, & Wagner, 2003 ).

Job Demands-Control/Support (JD-C/S) and Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) Model

Focusing more closely on concrete aspects of work demands and the extent to which a person perceives he or she has control or decision latitude over those demands, Karasek ( 1979 ) developed the JD-C model. Karasek and Theorell ( 1990 ) posited that high job demands under conditions of little decision latitude or control yield high strains, which have varied implications on the health of an organization (e.g., in terms of high turnover, employee ill-health, poor organizational performance). This theory was modified slightly to address not only control, but also other resources that could protect a person from unruly job demands, including support (aka JD-C/S, Johnson & Hall, 1988 ; and JD-R, Bakker, van Veldhoven, & Xanthopoulou, 2010 ). Whether focusing on control or resources, both they and job demands are said to reflect workplace characteristics, while control and resources also represent coping strategies or tools (Siegrist, 2010 ).

Despite the glut of research testing the JD-C and JD-R, results are somewhat mixed. Testing the interaction between job demands and control, Beehr, Glaser, Canali, and Wallwey ( 2001 ) did not find empirical support for the JD-C theory. However, Dawson, O’Brien, and Beehr ( 2016 ) found that high control and high support buffered against the independent deleterious effects of interpersonal conflict, role conflict, and organizational politics (demands that were categorized as hindrance stressors) on anxiety, as well as the effects of interpersonal conflict and organizational politics on physiological symptoms, but control and support did not moderate the effects between challenge stressors and strains. Coupled with Bakker, Demerouti, and Sanz-Vergel’s ( 2014 ) note that excessive job demands are a source of strain, but increased job resources are a source of engagement, Dawson et al.’s results suggest that when an organization identifies that demands are hindrances, it can create strategies for primary (preventative) stress management interventions and attempt to remove or reduce such work demands. If the demands are challenging, though manageable, but latitude to control the challenging stressors and support are insufficient, the organization could modify practices and train employees on adopting better strategies for meeting or coping (secondary stress management intervention) with the demands. Finally, if the organization can neither afford to modify the demands or the level of control and support, it will be necessary for the organization to develop stress management (tertiary) interventions to deal with the inevitable strains.

Conservation of Resources Theory

The idea that job resources reinforce engagement in work has been propagated in Hobfoll’s ( 1989 ) Conservation of Resources (COR) theory. COR theory also draws on the foundational premise that people’s mental health is a function of the person and the environment, forwarding that how people interpret their environment (including the societal context) affects their stress levels. Hobfoll focuses on resources such as objects, personal characteristics, conditions, or energies as particularly instrumental to minimizing strains. He asserts that people do whatever they can to protect their valued resources. Thus, strains develop when resources are threatened to be taken away, actually taken away, or when additional resources are not attainable after investing in the possibility of gaining more resources (Hobfoll, 2001 ). By extension, organizations can invest in activities that would minimize resource loss and create opportunities for resource gains and thus have direct implications for devising primary and secondary stress management interventions.

Transactional Framework

Lazarus and Folkman ( 1984 ) developed the widely studied transactional framework of stress. This framework holds as a key component the cognitive appraisal process. When individuals perceive factors in the work environment as a threat (i.e., primary appraisal), they will scan the available resources (external or internal to himself or herself) to cope with the stressors (i.e., secondary appraisal). If the coping resources provide minimal relief, strains develop. Until recently, little attention has been given to the cognitive appraisal associated with different work stressors (Dewe & Kompier, 2008 ; Liu & Li, 2017 ). In a study of Polish and Spanish social care service providers, stressors appraised as a threat related positively to burnout and less engagement, but stressors perceived as challenges yielded greater engagement and less burnout (Kożusznik, Rodriguez, & Peiro, 2012 ). Similarly, Dawson et al. ( 2016 ) found that even with support and control resources, hindrance demands were more strain-producing than challenge demands, suggesting that appraisal of the stressor is important. In fact, “many people respond well to challenging work” (Beehr et al., 2001 , p. 126). Kożusznik et al. ( 2012 ) recommend training employees to change the way they view work demands in order to increase engagement, considering that part of the problem may be about how the person appraises his or her environment and, thus, copes with the stressors.

Effort-Reward Imbalance

Siegrist’s ( 1996 ) Model of Effort-Reward Imbalance (ERI) focuses on the notion of social reciprocity, such that a person fulfills required work tasks in exchange for desired rewards (Siegrist, 2010 ). ERI sheds light on how an imbalance in a person’s expectations of an organization’s rewards (e.g., pay, bonus, sense of advancement and development, job security) in exchange for a person’s efforts, that is a break in one’s work contract, leads to negative responses, including long-term ill-health (Siegrist, 2010 ; Siegrist et al., 2014 ). In fact, prolonged perception of a work contract imbalance leads to adverse health, including immunological problems and inflammation, which contribute to cardiovascular disease (Siegrist, 2010 ). The model resembles the relational and interactional psychological contract theory in that it describes an employee’s perception of the terms of the relationship between the person and the workplace, including expectations of performance, job security, training and development opportunities, career progression, salary, and bonuses (Thomas, Au, & Ravlin, 2003 ). The psychological contract, like the ERI model, focuses on social exchange. Furthermore, the psychological contract, like stress theories, are influenced by cultural factors that shape how people interpret their environments (Glazer, 2008 ; Thomas et al., 2003 ). Violations of the psychological contract will negatively affect a person’s attitudes toward the workplace and subsequent health and well-being (Siegrist, 2010 ). To remediate strain, Siegrist ( 2010 ) focuses on both the person and the environment, recognizing that the organization is particularly responsible for changing unfavorable work conditions and the person is responsible for modifying his or her reactions to such conditions.

Stress Management Interventions: Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary

Remediation of work stress and organizational development interventions are about realigning the employee’s experiences in the workplace with factors in the environment, as well as closing the gap between the current environment and the desired environment. Work stress develops when an employee perceives the work demands to exceed the person’s resources to cope and thus threatens employee well-being (Dewe & Kompier, 2008 ). Likewise, an organization’s need to change arises when forces in the environment are creating a need to change in order to survive (see Figure 1 ). Lewin’s ( 1951 ) Force Field Analysis, the foundations of which are in Field Theory, is one of the first organizational development intervention tools presented in the social science literature. The concept behind Force Field Analysis is that in order to survive, organizations must adapt to environmental forces driving a need for organizational change and remove restraining forces that create obstacles to organizational change. In order to do this, management needs to delineate the current field in which the organization is functioning, understand the driving forces for change, identify and dampen or eliminate the restraining forces against change. Several models for analyses may be applied, but most approaches are variations of organizational climate surveys.

Through organizational surveys, workers provide management with a snapshot view of how they perceive aspects of their work environment. Thus, the view of the health of an organization is a function of several factors, chief among them employees’ views (i.e., the climate) about the workplace (Lewin, 1951 ). Indeed, French and Kahn ( 1962 ) posited that well-being depends on the extent to which properties of the person and properties of the environment align in terms of what a person requires and the resources available in a given environment. Therefore, only when properties of the person and properties of the environment are sufficiently understood can plans for change be developed and implemented targeting the environment (e.g., change reporting structures to relieve, and thus prevent future, communication stressors) and/or the person (e.g., providing more autonomy, vacation days, training on new technology). In short, climate survey findings can guide consultants about the emphasis for organizational interventions: before a problem arises aka stress prevention, e.g., carefully crafting job roles), when a problem is present, but steps are taken to mitigate their consequences (aka coping, e.g., providing social support groups), and/or once strains develop (aka. stress management, e.g., healthcare management policies).

For each of the primary (prevention), secondary (coping), and tertiary (stress management) techniques the target for intervention can be the entire workforce, a subset of the workforce, or a specific person. Interventions that target the entire workforce may be considered organizational interventions, as they have direct implications on the health of all individuals and consequently the health of the organization. Several interventions categorized as primary and secondary interventions may also be implemented after strains have developed and after it has been discerned that a person or the organization did not do enough to mitigate stressors or strains (see Figure 1 ). The designation of many of the interventions as belonging to one category or another may be viewed as merely a suggestion.

Primary Interventions (Preventative Stress Management)

Before individuals begin to perceive work-related stressors, organizations engage in stress prevention strategies, such as providing people with resources (e.g., computers, printers, desk space, information about the job role, organizational reporting structures) to do their jobs. However, sometimes the institutional structures and resources are insufficient or ambiguous. Scholars and practitioners have identified several preventative stress management strategies that may be implemented.

Planning and Time Management

When employees feel quantitatively overloaded, sometimes the remedy is improving the employees’ abilities to plan and manage their time (Quick, Quick, Nelson, & Hurrell, 2003 ). Planning is a future-oriented activity that focuses on conceptual and comprehensive work goals. Time management is a behavior that focuses on organizing, prioritizing, and scheduling work activities to achieve short-term goals. Given the purpose of time management, it is considered a primary intervention, as engaging in time management helps to prevent work tasks from mounting and becoming unmanageable, which would subsequently lead to adverse outcomes. Time management comprises three fundamental components: (1) establishing goals, (2) identifying and prioritizing tasks to fulfill the goals, and (3) scheduling and monitoring progress toward goal achievement (Peeters & Rutte, 2005 ). Workers who employ time management have less role ambiguity (Macan, Shahani, Dipboye, & Philips, 1990 ), psychological stress or strain (Adams & Jex, 1999 ; Jex & Elaqua, 1999 ; Macan et al., 1990 ), and greater job satisfaction (Macan, 1994 ). However, Macan ( 1994 ) did not find a relationship between time management and performance. Still, Claessens, van Eerde, Rutte, and Roe ( 2004 ) found that perceived control of time partially mediated the relationships between planning behavior (an indicator of time management), job autonomy, and workload on one hand, and job strains, job satisfaction, and job performance on the other hand. Moreover, Peeters and Rutte ( 2005 ) observed that teachers with high work demands and low autonomy experienced more burnout when they had poor time management skills.

Person-Organization Fit

Just as it is important for organizations to find the right person for the job and organization, so is it the responsibility of a person to choose to work at the right organization—an organization that fulfills the person’s needs and upholds the values important to the individual, as much as the person fulfills the organization’s needs and adapts to its values. When people fit their employing organizations they are setting themselves up for experiencing less strain-producing stressors (Kristof-Brown et al., 2005 ). In a meta-analysis of 62 person-job fit studies and 110 person-organization fit studies, Kristof-Brown et al. ( 2005 ) found that person-job fit had a negative correlation with indicators of job strain. In fact, a primary intervention of career counseling can help to reduce stress levels (Firth-Cozens, 2003 ).

Job Redesign

The Job Demands-Control/Support (JD-C/S), Job Demands-Resources (JD-R), and transactional models all suggest that factors in the work context require modifications in order to reduce potential ill-health and poor organizational performance. Drawing on Hackman and Oldham’s ( 1980 ) Job Characteristics Model, it is possible to assess with the Job Diagnostics Survey (JDS) the current state of work characteristics related to skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback. Modifying those aspects would help create a sense of meaningfulness, sense of responsibility, and feeling of knowing how one is performing, which subsequently affects a person’s well-being as identified in assessments of motivation, satisfaction, improved performance, and reduced withdrawal intentions and behaviors. Extending this argument to the stress models, it can be deduced that reducing uncertainty or perceived unfairness that may be associated with a person’s perception of these work characteristics, as well as making changes to physical characteristics of the environment (e.g., lighting, seating, desk, air quality), nature of work (e.g., job responsibilities, roles, decision-making latitude), and organizational arrangements (e.g., reporting structure and feedback mechanisms), can help mitigate against numerous ill-health consequences and reduced organizational performance. In fact, Fried et al. ( 2013 ) showed that healthy patients of a medical clinic whose jobs were excessively low (i.e., monotonous) or excessively high (i.e., overstimulating) on job enrichment (as measured by the JDS) had greater abdominal obesity than those whose jobs were optimally enriched. By taking stock of employees’ perceptions of the current work situation, managers might think about ways to enhance employees’ coping toolkit, such as training on how to deal with difficult clients or creating stimulating opportunities when jobs have low levels of enrichment.

Participatory Action Research Interventions

Participatory action research (PAR) is an intervention wherein, through group discussions, employees help to identify and define problems in organizational structure, processes, policies, practices, and reward structures, as well as help to design, implement, and evaluate success of solutions. PAR is in itself an intervention, but its goal is to design interventions to eliminate or reduce work-related factors that are impeding performance and causing people to be unwell. An example of a successful primary intervention, utilizing principles of PAR and driven by the JD-C and JD-C/S stress frameworks is Health Circles (HCs; Aust & Ducki, 2004 ).

HCs, developed in Germany in the 1980s, were popular practices in industries, such as metal, steel, and chemical, and service. Similar to other problem-solving practices, such as quality circles, HCs were based on the assumptions that employees are the experts of their jobs. For this reason, to promote employee well-being, management and administrators solicited suggestions and ideas from the employees to improve occupational health, thereby increasing employees’ job control. HCs also promoted communication between managers and employees, which had a potential to increase social support. With more control and support, employees would experience less strains and better occupational well-being.

Employing the three-steps of (1) problem analysis (i.e., diagnosis or discovery through data generated from organizational records of absenteeism length, frequency, rate, and reason and employee survey), (2) HC meetings (6 to 10 meetings held over several months to brainstorm ideas to improve occupational safety and health concerns identified in the discovery phase), and (3) HC evaluation (to determine if desired changes were accomplished and if employees’ reports of stressors and strains changed after the course of 15 months), improvements were to be expected (Aust & Ducki, 2004 ). Aust and Ducki ( 2004 ) reviewed 11 studies presenting 81 health circles in 30 different organizations. Overall study participants had high satisfaction with the HCs practices. Most companies acted upon employees’ suggestions (e.g., improving driver’s seat and cab, reducing ticket sale during drive, team restructuring and job rotation to facilitate communication, hiring more employees during summer time, and supervisor training program to improve leadership and communication skills) to improve work conditions. Thus, HCs represent a successful theory-grounded intervention to routinely improve employees’ occupational health.

Physical Setting

The physical environment or physical workspace has an enormous impact on individuals’ well-being, attitudes, and interactions with others, as well as on the implications on innovation and well-being (Oksanen & Ståhle, 2013 ; Vischer, 2007 ). In a study of 74 new product development teams (total of 437 study respondents) in Western Europe, Chong, van Eerde, Rutte, and Chai ( 2012 ) found that when teams were faced with challenge time pressures, meaning the teams had a strong interest and desire in tackling complex, but engaging tasks, when they were working proximally close with one another, team communication improved. Chong et al. assert that their finding aligns with prior studies that have shown that physical proximity promotes increased awareness of other team members, greater tendency to initiate conversations, and greater team identification. However, they also found that when faced with hindrance time pressures, physical proximity related to low levels of team communication, but when hindrance time pressure was low, team proximity had an increasingly greater positive relationship with team communication.

In addition to considering the type of work demand teams must address, other physical workspace considerations include whether people need to work collaboratively and synchronously or independently and remotely (or a combination thereof). Consideration needs to be given to how company contributors would satisfy client needs through various modes of communication, such as email vs. telephone, and whether individuals who work by a window might need shading to block bright sunlight from glaring on their computer screens. Finally, people who have to use the telephone for extensive periods of time would benefit from earphones to prevent neck strains. Most physical stressors are rather simple to rectify. However, companies are often not aware of a problem until after a problem arises, such as when a person’s back is strained from trying to move heavy equipment. Companies then implement strategies to remediate the environmental stressor. With the help of human factors, and organizational and office design consultants, many of the physical barriers to optimal performance can be prevented (Rousseau & Aubé, 2010 ). In a study of 215 French-speaking Canadian healthcare employees, Rousseau and Aubé ( 2010 ) found that although supervisor instrumental support positively related with affective commitment to the organization, the relationship was even stronger for those who reported satisfaction with the ambient environment (i.e., temperature, lighting, sound, ventilation, and cleanliness).

Secondary Interventions (Coping)

Secondary interventions, also referred to as coping, focus on resources people can use to mitigate the risk of work-related illness or workplace injury. Resources may include properties related to social resources, behaviors, and cognitive structures. Each of these resource domains may be employed to cope with stressors. Monat and Lazarus ( 1991 ) summarize the definition of coping as “an individual’s efforts to master demands (or conditions of harm, threat, or challenge) that are appraised (or perceived) as exceeding or taxing his or her resources” (p. 5). To master demands requires use of the aforementioned resources. Secondary interventions help employees become aware of the psychological, physical, and behavioral responses that may occur from the stressors presented in their working environment. Secondary interventions help a person detect and attend to stressors and identify resources for and ways of mitigating job strains. Often, coping strategies are learned skills that have a cognitive foundation and serve important functions in improving people’s management of stressors (Lazarus & Folkman, 1991 ). Coping is effortful, but with practice it becomes easier to employ. This idea is the foundation for understanding the role of resilience in coping with stressors. However, “not all adaptive processes are coping. Coping is a subset of adaptational activities that involves effort and does not include everything that we do in relating to the environment” (Lazarus & Folkman, 1991 , p. 198). Furthermore, sometimes to cope with a stressor, a person may call upon social support sources to help with tangible materials or emotional comfort. People call upon support resources because they help to restructure how a person approaches or thinks about the stressor.

Most secondary interventions are aimed at helping the individual, though companies, as a policy, might require all employees to partake in training aimed at increasing employees’ awareness of and skills aimed at handling difficult situations vis à vis company channels (e.g., reporting on sexual harassment or discrimination). Furthermore, organizations might institute mentoring programs or work groups to address various work-related matters. These programs employ awareness-raising activities, stress-education, or skills training (cf., Bhagat, Segovis, & Nelson, 2012 ), which include development of skills in problem-solving, understanding emotion-focused coping, identifying and using social support, and enhancing capacity for resilience. The aim of these programs, therefore, is to help employees proactively review their perceptions of psychological, physical, and behavioral job-related strains, thereby extending their resilience, enabling them to form a personal plan to control stressors and practice coping skills (Cooper, Dewe, & O’Driscoll, 2011 ).

Often these stress management programs are instituted after an organization has observed excessive absenteeism and work-related performance problems and, therefore, are sometimes categorized as a tertiary stress management intervention or even a primary (prevention) intervention. However, the skills developed for coping with stressors also place the programs in secondary stress management interventions. Example programs that are categorized as tertiary or primary stress management interventions may also be secondary stress management interventions (see Figure 1 ), and these include lifestyle advice and planning, stress inoculation training, simple relaxation techniques, meditation, basic trainings in time management, anger management, problem-solving skills, and cognitive-behavioral therapy. Corporate wellness programs also fall under this category. In other words, some programs could be categorized as primary, secondary, or tertiary interventions depending upon when the employee (or organization) identifies the need to implement the program. For example, time management practices could be implemented as a means of preventing some stressors, as a way to cope with mounting stressors, or as a strategy to mitigate symptoms of excessive of stressors. Furthermore, these programs can be administered at the individual level or group level. As related to secondary interventions, these programs provide participants with opportunities to develop and practice skills to cognitively reappraise the stressor(s); to modify their perspectives about stressors; to take time out to breathe, stretch, meditate, relax, and/or exercise in an attempt to support better decision-making; to articulate concerns and call upon support resources; and to know how to say “no” to onslaughts of requests to complete tasks. Participants also learn how to proactively identify coping resources and solve problems.

According to Cooper, Dewe, and O’Driscoll ( 2001 ), secondary interventions are successful in helping employees modify or strengthen their ability to cope with the experience of stressors with the goal of mitigating the potential harm the job stressors may create. Secondary interventions focus on individuals’ transactions with the work environment and emphasize the fit between a person and his or her environment. However, researchers have pointed out that the underlying assumption of secondary interventions is that the responsibility for coping with the stressors of the environment lies within individuals (Quillian-Wolever & Wolever, 2003 ). If companies cannot prevent the stressors in the first place, then they are, in part, responsible for helping individuals develop coping strategies and informing employees about programs that would help them better cope with job stressors so that they are able to fulfill work assignments.

Stress management interventions that help people learn to cope with stressors focus mainly on the goals of enabling problem-resolution or expressing one’s emotions in a healthy manner. These goals are referred to as problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping (Folkman & Lazarus, 1980 ; Pearlin & Schooler, 1978 ), and the person experiencing the stressors as potential threat is the agent for change and the recipient of the benefits of successful coping (Hobfoll, 1998 ). In addition to problem-focused and emotion-focused coping approaches, social support and resilience may be coping resources. There are many other sources for coping than there is room to present here (see e.g., Cartwright & Cooper, 2005 ); however, the current literature has primarily focused on these resources.

Problem-Focused Coping

Problem-focused or direct coping helps employees remove or reduce stressors in order to reduce their strain experiences (Bhagat et al., 2012 ). In problem-focused coping employees are responsible for working out a strategic plan in order to remove job stressors, such as setting up a set of goals and engaging in behaviors to meet these goals. Problem-focused coping is viewed as an adaptive response, though it can also be maladaptive if it creates more problems down the road, such as procrastinating getting work done or feigning illness to take time off from work. Adaptive problem-focused coping negatively relates to long-term job strains (Higgins & Endler, 1995 ). Discussion on problem-solving coping is framed from an adaptive perspective.

Problem-focused coping is featured as an extension of control, because engaging in problem-focused coping strategies requires a series of acts to keep job stressors under control (Bhagat et al., 2012 ). In the stress literature, there are generally two ways to categorize control: internal versus external locus of control, and primary versus secondary control. Locus of control refers to the extent to which people believe they have control over their own life (Rotter, 1966 ). People high in internal locus of control believe that they can control their own fate whereas people high in external locus of control believe that outside factors determine their life experience (Rotter, 1966 ). Generally, those with an external locus of control are less inclined to engage in problem-focused coping (Strentz & Auerbach, 1988 ). Primary control is the belief that people can directly influence their environment (Alloy & Abramson, 1979 ), and thus they are more likely to engage in problem-focused coping. However, when it is not feasible to exercise primary control, people search for secondary control, with which people try to adapt themselves into the objective environment (Rothbaum, Weisz, & Snyder, 1982 ).

Emotion-Focused Coping

Emotion-focused coping, sometimes referred to as palliative coping, helps employees reduce strains without the removal of job stressors. It involves cognitive or emotional efforts, such as talking about the stressor or distracting oneself from the stressor, in order to lessen emotional distress resulting from job stressors (Bhagat et al., 2012 ). Emotion-focused coping aims to reappraise and modify the perceptions of a situation or seek emotional support from friends or family. These methods do not include efforts to change the work situation or to remove the job stressors (Lazarus & Folkman, 1991 ). People tend to adopt emotion-focused coping strategies when they believe that little or nothing can be done to remove the threatening, harmful, and challenging stressors (Bhagat et al., 2012 ), such as when they are the only individuals to have the skills to get a project done or they are given increased responsibilities because of the unexpected departure of a colleague. Emotion-focused coping strategies include (1) reappraisal of the stressful situation, (2) talking to friends and receiving reassurance from them, (3) focusing on one’s strength rather than weakness, (4) optimistic comparison—comparing one’s situation to others’ or one’s past situation, (5) selective ignoring—paying less attention to the unpleasant aspects of one’s job and being more focused on the positive aspects of the job, (6) restrictive expectations—restricting one’s expectations on job satisfaction but paying more attention to monetary rewards, (7) avoidance coping—not thinking about the problem, leaving the situation, distracting oneself, or using alcohol or drugs (e.g., Billings & Moos, 1981 ).

Some emotion-focused coping strategies are maladaptive. For example, avoidance coping may lead to increased level of job strains in the long run (e.g., Parasuraman & Cleek, 1984 ). Furthermore, a person’s ability to cope with the imbalance of performing work to meet organizational expectations can take a toll on the person’s health, leading to physiological consequences such as cardiovascular disease, sleep disorders, gastrointestinal disorders, and diabetes (Fried et al., 2013 ; Siegrist, 2010 ; Toker, Shirom, Melamed, & Armon, 2012 ; Willert, Thulstrup, Hertz, & Bonde, 2010 ).

Comparing Coping Strategies across Cultures

Most coping research is conducted in individualistic, Western cultures wherein emotional control is emphasized and both problem-solving focused coping and primary control are preferred (Bhagat et al., 2010 ). However, in collectivistic cultures, emotion-focused coping and use of secondary control may be preferred and may not necessarily carry a negative evaluation (Bhagat et al., 2010 ). For example, African Americans are more likely to use emotion-focused coping than non–African Americans (Knight, Silverstein, McCallum, & Fox, 2000 ), and among women who experienced sexual harassment, Anglo American women were less likely to employ emotion focused coping (i.e., avoidance coping) than Turkish women and Hispanic American women, while Hispanic women used more denial than the other two groups (Wasti & Cortina, 2002 ).

Thus, whereas problem-focused coping is venerated in Western societies, emotion-focused coping may be more effective in reducing strains in collectivistic cultures, such as China, Japan, and India (Bhagat et al., 2010 ; Narayanan, Menon, & Spector, 1999 ; Selmer, 2002 ). Indeed, Swedish participants reported more problem-focused coping than did Chinese participants (Xiao, Ottosson, & Carlsson, 2013 ), American college students engaged in more problem-focused coping behaviors than did their Japanese counterparts (Ogawa, 2009 ), and Indian (vs. Canadian) students reported more emotion-focused coping, such as seeking social support and positive reappraisal (Sinha, Willson, & Watson, 2000 ). Moreover, Glazer, Stetz, and Izso ( 2004 ) found that internal locus of control was more predominant in individualistic cultures (United Kingdom and United States), whereas external locus of control was more predominant in communal cultures (Italy and Hungary). Also, internal locus of control was associated with less job stress, but more so for nurses in the United Kingdom and United States than Italy and Hungary. Taken together, adoption of coping strategies and their effectiveness differ significantly across cultures. The extent to which a coping strategy is perceived favorably and thus selected or not selected is not only a function of culture, but also a person’s sociocultural beliefs toward the coping strategy (Morimoto, Shimada, & Ozaki, 2013 ).

Social Support

Social support refers to the aid an entity gives to a person. The source of the support can be a single person, such as a supervisor, coworker, subordinate, family member, friend, or stranger, or an organization as represented by upper-level management representing organizational practices. The type of support can be instrumental or emotional. Instrumental support, including informational support, refers to that which is tangible, such as data to help someone make a decision or colleagues’ sick days so one does not lose vital pay while recovering from illness. Emotional support, including esteem support, refers to the psychological boost given to a person who needs to express emotions and feel empathy from others or to have his or her perspective validated. Beehr and Glazer ( 2001 ) present an overview of the role of social support on the stressor-strain relationship and arguments regarding the role of culture in shaping the utility of different sources and types of support.

Meaningfulness and Resilience

Meaningfulness reflects the extent to which people believe their lives are significant, purposeful, goal-directed, and fulfilling (Glazer, Kożusznik, Meyers, & Ganai, 2014 ). When faced with stressors, people who have a strong sense of meaning in life will also try to make sense of the stressors. Maintaining a positive outlook on life stressors helps to manage emotions, which is helpful in reducing strains, particularly when some stressors cannot be problem-solved (Lazarus & Folkman, 1991 ). Lazarus and Folkman ( 1991 ) emphasize that being able to reframe threatening situations can be just as important in an adaptation as efforts to control the stressors. Having a sense of meaningfulness motivates people to behave in ways that help them overcome stressors. Thus, meaningfulness is often used in the same breath as resilience, because people who are resilient are often protecting that which is meaningful.

Resilience is a personality state that can be fortified and enhanced through varied experiences. People who perceive their lives are meaningful are more likely to find ways to face adversity and are therefore more prone to intensifying their resiliency. When people demonstrate resilience to cope with noxious stressors, their ability to be resilient against other stressors strengthens because through the experience, they develop more competencies (Glazer et al., 2014 ). Thus, fitting with Hobfoll’s ( 1989 , 2001 ) COR theory, meaningfulness and resilience are psychological resources people attempt to conserve and protect, and employ when necessary for making sense of or coping with stressors.

Tertiary Interventions (Stress Management)

Stress management refers to interventions employed to treat and repair harmful repercussions of stressors that were not coped with sufficiently. As Lazarus and Folkman ( 1991 ) noted, not all stressors “are amenable to mastery” (p. 205). Stressors that are unmanageable and lead to strains require interventions to reverse or slow down those effects. Workplace interventions might focus on the person, the organization, or both. Unfortunately, instead of looking at the whole system to include the person and the workplace, most companies focus on the person. Such a focus should not be a surprise given the results of van der Klink, Blonk, Schene, and van Dijk’s ( 2001 ) meta-analysis of 48 experimental studies conducted between 1977 and 1996 . They found that of four types of tertiary interventions, the effect size for cognitive-behavioral interventions and multimodal programs (e.g., the combination of assertive training and time management) was moderate and the effect size for relaxation techniques was small in reducing psychological complaints, but not turnover intention related to work stress. However, the effects of (the five studies that used) organization-focused interventions were not significant. Similarly, Richardson and Rothstein’s ( 2008 ) meta-analytic study, including 36 experimental studies with 55 interventions, showed a larger effect size for cognitive-behavioral interventions than relaxation, organizational, multimodal, or alternative. However, like with van der Klink et al. ( 2001 ), Richardson and Rothstein ( 2008 ) cautioned that there were few organizational intervention studies included and the impact of interventions were determined on the basis of psychological outcomes and not physiological or organizational outcomes. Van der Klink et al. ( 2001 ) further expressed concern that organizational interventions target the workplace and that changes in the individual may take longer to observe than individual interventions aimed directly at the individual.

The long-term benefits of individual focused interventions are not yet clear either. Per Giga, Cooper, and Faragher ( 2003 ), the benefits of person-directed stress management programs will be short-lived if organizational factors to reduce stressors are not addressed too. Indeed, LaMontagne, Keegel, Louie, Ostry, and Landsbergis ( 2007 ), in their meta-analysis of 90 studies on stress management interventions published between 1990 and 2005 , revealed that in relation to interventions targeting organizations only, and interventions targeting individuals only, interventions targeting both organizations and individuals (i.e. the systems approach) had the most favorable positive effects on both the organizations and the individuals. Furthermore, the organization-level interventions were effective at both the individual and organization levels, but the individual-level interventions were effective only at the individual level.

Individual-Focused Stress Management

Individual-focused interventions concentrate on improving conditions for the individual, though counseling programs emphasize that the worker is in charge of reducing “stress,” whereas role-focused interventions emphasize activities that organizations can guide to actually reduce unnecessary noxious environmental factors.

Individual-Focused Stress Management: Employee Assistance Programs

When stress become sufficiently problematic (which is individually gauged or attended to by supportive others) in a worker’s life, employees may utilize the short-term counseling services or referral services Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) provide. People who utilize the counseling services may engage in cognitive behavioral therapy aimed at changing the way people think about the stressors (e.g., as challenge opportunity over threat) and manage strains. Example topics that may be covered in these therapy sessions include time management and goal setting (prioritization), career planning and development, cognitive restructuring and mindfulness, relaxation, and anger management. In a study of healthcare workers and teachers who participated in a 2-day to 2.5-day comprehensive stress management training program (including 26 topics on identifying, coping with, and managing stressors and strains), Siu, Cooper, and Phillips ( 2013 ) found psychological and physical improvements were self-reported among the healthcare workers (for which there was no control group). However, comparing an intervention group of teachers to a control group of teachers, the extent of change was not as visible, though teachers in the intervention group engaged in more mastery recovery experiences (i.e., they purposefully chose to engage in challenging activities after work).

Individual-Focused Stress Management: Mindfulness

A popular therapy today is to train people to be more mindful, which involves helping people live in the present, reduce negative judgement of current and past experiences, and practicing patience (Birnie, Speca, & Carlson, 2010 ). Mindfulness programs usually include training on relaxation exercises, gentle yoga, and awareness of the body’s senses. In one study offered through the continuing education program at a Canadian university, 104 study participants took part in an 8-week, 90 minute per group (15–20 participants per) session mindfulness program (Birnie et al., 2010 ). In addition to body scanning, they also listened to lectures on incorporating mindfulness into one’s daily life and received a take-home booklet and compact discs that guided participants through the exercises studied in person. Two weeks after completing the program, participants’ mindfulness attendance and general positive moods increased, while physical, psychological, and behavioral strains decreased. In another study on a sample of U.K. government employees, study participants receiving three sessions of 2.5 to 3 hours each training on mindfulness, with the first two sessions occurring in consecutive weeks and the third occurring about three months later, Flaxman and Bond ( 2010 ) found that compared to the control group, the intervention group showed a decrease in distress levels from Time 1 (baseline) to Time 2 (three months after first two training sessions) and Time 1 to Time 3 (after final training session). Moreover, of the mindfulness intervention study participants who were clinically distressed, 69% experienced clinical improvement in their psychological health.

Individual-Focused Stress Management: Biofeedback/Imagery/Meditation/Deep Breathing

Biofeedback uses electronic equipment to inform users about how their body is responding to tension. With guidance from a therapist, individuals then learn to change their physiological responses so that their pulse normalizes and muscles relax (Norris, Fahrion, & Oikawa, 2007 ). The therapist’s guidance might include reminders for imagery, meditation, body scan relaxation, and deep breathing. Saunders, Driskell, Johnston, and Salas’s ( 1996 ) meta-analysis of 37 studies found that imagery helped reduce state and performance anxiety. Once people have been trained to relax, reminder triggers may be sent through smartphone push notifications (Villani et al., 2013 ).

Smartphone technology can also be used to support weight loss programs, smoking cessation programs, and medication or disease (e.g., diabetes) management compliance (Heron & Smyth, 2010 ; Kannampallil, Waicekauskas, Morrow, Kopren, & Fu, 2013 ). For example, smartphones could remind a person to take medications or test blood sugar levels or send messages about healthy behaviors and positive affirmations.

Individual-Focused Stress Management: Sleep/Rest/Respite

Workers today sleep less per night than adults did nearly 30 years ago (Luckhaupt, Tak, & Calvert, 2010 ; National Sleep Foundation, 2005 , 2013 ). In order to combat problems, such as increased anxiety and cardiovascular artery disease, associated with sleep deprivation and insufficient rest, it is imperative that people disconnect from their work at least one day per week or preferably for several weeks so that they are able to restore psychological health (Etzion, Eden, & Lapidot, 1998 ; Ragsdale, Beehr, Grebner, & Han, 2011 ). When college students engaged in relaxation-type activities, such as reading or watching television, over the weekend, they experienced less emotional exhaustion and greater general well-being than students who engaged in resources-consuming activities, such as house cleaning (Ragsdale et al., 2011 ). Additional research and future directions for research are reviewed and identified in the work of Sonnentag ( 2012 ). For example, she asks whether lack of ability to detach from work is problematic for people who find their work meaningful. In other words, are negative health consequences only among those who do not take pleasure in their work? Sonnetag also asks how teleworkers detach from their work when engaging in work from the home. Ironically, one of the ways that companies are trying to help with the challenges of high workload or increased need to be available to colleagues, clients, or vendors around the globe is by offering flexible work arrangements, whereby employees who can work from home are given the opportunity to do so. Companies that require global interactions 24-hours per day often employ this strategy, but is the solution also a source of strain (Glazer, Kożusznik, & Shargo, 2012 )?

Individual-Focused Stress Management: Role Analysis

Role analysis or role clarification aims to redefine, expressly identify, and align employees’ roles and responsibilities with their work goals. Through role negotiation, involved parties begin to develop a new formal or informal contract about expectations and define resources needed to fulfill those expectations. Glazer has used this approach in organizational consulting and, with one memorable client engagement, found that not only were the individuals whose roles required deeper re-evaluation happier at work (six months later), but so were their subordinates. Subordinates who once characterized the two partners as hostile and akin to a couple going through a bad divorce, later referred to them as a blissful pair. Schaubroeck, Ganster, Sime, and Ditman ( 1993 ) also found in a three-wave study over a two-year period that university employees’ reports of role clarity and greater satisfaction with their supervisor increased after a role clarification exercise of top managers’ roles and subordinates’ roles. However, the intervention did not have any impact on reported physical symptoms, absenteeism, or psychological well-being. Role analysis is categorized under individual-focused stress management intervention because it is usually implemented after individuals or teams begin to demonstrate poor performance and because the intervention typically focuses on a few individuals rather than an entire organization or group. In other words, the intervention treats the person’s symptoms by redefining the role so as to eliminate the stimulant causing the problem.

Organization-Focused Stress Management

At the organizational level, companies that face major declines in productivity and profitability or increased costs related to healthcare and disability might be motivated to reassess organizational factors that might be impinging on employees’ health and well-being. After all, without healthy workers, it is not possible to have a healthy organization. Companies may choose to implement practices and policies that are expected to help not only the employees, but also the organization with reduced costs associated with employee ill-health, such as medical insurance, disability payments, and unused office space. Example practices and policies that may be implemented include flexible work arrangements to ensure that employees are not on the streets in the middle of the night for work that can be done from anywhere (such as the home), diversity programs to reduce stress-induced animosity and prejudice toward others, providing only healthy food choices in cafeterias, mandating that all employees have physicals in order to receive reduced prices for insurance, company-wide closures or mandatory paid time off, and changes in organizational visioning.

Organization-Focused Stress Management: Organizational-Level Occupational Health Interventions

As with job design interventions that are implemented to remediate work characteristics that were a source of unnecessary or excessive stressors, so are organizational-level occupational health (OLOH) interventions. As with many of the interventions, its placement as a primary or tertiary stress management intervention may seem arbitrary, but when considering the goal and target of change, it is clear that the intervention is implemented in response to some ailing organizational issues that need to be reversed or stopped, and because it brings in the entire organization’s workforce to address the problems, it has been placed in this category. There are several more case studies than empirical studies on the topic of whole system organizational change efforts (see example case studies presented by the United Kingdom’s Health and Safety Executive). It is possible that lack of published empirical work is not so much due to lack of attempting to gather and evaluate the data for publication, but rather because the OLOH interventions themselves never made it to the intervention stage, the interventions failed (Biron, Gatrell, & Cooper, 2010 ), or the level of evaluation was not rigorous enough to get into empirical peer-review journals. Fortunately, case studies provide some indication of the opportunities and problems associated with OLOH interventions.

One case study regarding Cardiff and Value University Health Board revealed that through focus group meetings with members of a steering group (including high-level managers and supported by top management) and facilitated by a neutral, non-judgemental organizational health consultant, ideas for change were posted on newsprint, discussed, and areas in the organization needing change were identified. The intervention for giving voice to people who initially had little already had a positive effect on the organization, as absence decreased by 2.09% and 6.9% merely 12 and 18 months, respectively, after the intervention. Translated in financial terms, the 6.9% change was equivalent to a quarterly savings of £80,000 (Health & Safety Executive, n.d. ). Thus, focusing on the context of change and how people will be involved in the change process probably helped the organization realize improvements (Biron et al., 2010 ). In a recent and rare empirical study, employing both qualitative and quantitative data collection methods, Sørensen and Holman ( 2014 ) utilized PAR in order to plan and implement an OLOH intervention over the course of 14 months. Their study aimed to examine the effectiveness of the PAR process in reducing workers’ work-related and social or interpersonal-related stressors that derive from the workplace and improving psychological, behavioral, and physiological well-being across six Danish organizations. Based on group dialogue, 30 proposals for change were proposed, all of which could be categorized as either interventions to focus on relational factors (e.g., management feedback improvement, engagement) or work processes (e.g., reduced interruptions, workload, reinforcing creativity). Of the interventions that were implemented, results showed improvements on manager relationship quality and reduced burnout, but no changes with respect to work processes (i.e., workload and work pace) perhaps because the employees already had sufficient task control and variety. These findings support Dewe and Kompier’s ( 2008 ) position that occupational health can be reinforced through organizational policies that reinforce quality jobs and work experiences.

Organization-Focused Stress Management: Flexible Work Arrangements

Dewe and Kompier ( 2008 ), citing the work of Isles ( 2005 ), noted that concern over losing one’s job is a reason for why 40% of survey respondents indicated they work more hours than formally required. In an attempt to create balance and perceived fairness in one’s compensation for putting in extra work hours, employees will sometimes be legitimately or illegitimately absent. As companies become increasingly global, many people with desk jobs are finding themselves communicating with colleagues who are halfway around the globe and at all hours of the day or night (Glazer et al., 2012 ). To help minimize the strains associated with these stressors, companies might devise flexible work arrangements (FWA), though the type of FWA needs to be tailored to the cultural environment (Masuda et al., 2012 ). FWAs give employees some leverage to decide what would be the optimal work arrangement for them (e.g., part-time, flexible work hours, compressed work week, telecommuting). In other words, FWA provides employees with the choice of when to work, where to work (on-site or off-site), and how many hours to work in a day, week, or pay period (Kossek, Thompson, & Lautsch, 2015 ). However, not all employees of an organization have equal access to or equitable use of FWAs; workers in low-wage, hourly jobs are often beholden to being physically present during specific hours (Swanberg McKechnie, Ojha, & James, 2011 ). In a study of over 1,300 full-time hourly retail employees in the United States, Swanberg et al. ( 2011 ) showed that employees who have control over their work schedules and over their work hours were satisfied with their work schedules, perceived support from the supervisor, and work engagement.

Unfortunately, not all FWAs yield successful results for the individual or the organization. Being able to work from home or part-time can have problems too, as a person finds himself or herself working more hours from home than required. Sometimes telecommuting creates work-family conflict too as a person struggles to balance work and family obligations while working from home. Other drawbacks include reduced face-to-face contact between work colleagues and stakeholders, challenges shaping one’s career growth due to limited contact, perceived inequity if some have more flexibility than others, and ambiguity about work role processes for interacting with employees utilizing the FWA (Kossek et al., 2015 ). Organizations that institute FWAs must carefully weigh the benefits and drawbacks the flexibility may have on the employees using it or the employees affected by others using it, as well as the implications on the organization, including the vendors who are serving and clients served by the organization.

Organization-Focused Stress Management: Diversity Programs

Employees in the workplace might experience strain due to feelings of discrimination or prejudice. Organizational climates that do not promote diversity (in terms of age, religion, physical abilities, ethnicity, nationality, sex, and other characteristics) are breeding grounds for undesirable attitudes toward the workplace, lower performance, and greater turnover intention (Bergman, Palmieri, Drasgow, & Ormerod, 2012 ; Velez, Moradi, & Brewster, 2013 ). Management is thus advised to implement programs that reinforce the value and importance of diversity, as well as manage diversity to reduce conflict and feelings of prejudice. In fact, managers who attended a leadership training program reported higher multicultural competence in dealing with stressful situations (Chrobot-Mason & Leslie, 2012 ), and managers who persevered through challenges were more dedicated to coping with difficult diversity issues (Cilliers, 2011 ). Thus, diversity programs can help to reduce strains by directly reducing stressors associated with conflict linked to diversity in the workplace and by building managers’ resilience.

Organization-Focused Stress Management: Healthcare Management Policies

Over the past few years, organizations have adopted insurance plans that implement wellness programs for the sake of managing the increasing cost of healthcare that is believed to be a result of individuals’ not managing their own health, with regular check-ups and treatment. The wellness programs require all insured employees to visit a primary care provider, complete a health risk assessment, and engage in disease management activities as specified by a physician (e.g., see frequently asked questions regarding the State of Maryland’s Wellness Program). Companies believe that requiring compliance will reduce health problems, although there is no proof that such programs save money or that people would comply. One study that does, however, boast success, was a 12-week workplace health promotion program aimed at reducing Houston airport workers’ weight (Ebunlomo, Hare-Everline, Weber, & Rich, 2015 ). The program, which included 235 volunteer participants, was deemed a success, as there was a total weight loss of 345 pounds (or 1.5 lbs per person). Given such results in Houston, it is clear why some people are also skeptical over the likely success of wellness programs, particularly as there is no clear method for evaluating their efficacy (Sinnott & Vatz, 2015 ).

Moreover, for some, such a program is too paternalistic and intrusive, as well as punishes anyone who chooses not to actively participate in disease management programs (Sinnott & Vatz, 2015 ). The programs put the onus of change on the person, though it is a response to the high costs of ill-health. The programs neglect to consider the role of the organization in reducing the barriers to healthy lifestyle, such as cloaking exempt employment as simply needing to get the work done, when it usually means working significantly more hours than a standard workweek. In fact, workplace health promotion programs did not reduce presenteeism (i.e., people going to work while unwell thereby reducing their job performance) among those who suffered from physical pain (Cancelliere, Cassidy, Ammendolia, & Côte, 2011 ). However, supervisor education, worksite exercise, lifestyle intervention through email, midday respite from repetitive work, a global stress management program, changes in lighting, and telephone interventions helped to reduce presenteeism. Thus, emphasis needs to be placed on psychosocial aspects of the organization’s structure, including managers and overall organizational climate for on-site presence, that reinforces such behavior (Cancelliere et al., 2011 ). Moreover, wellness programs are only as good as the interventions to reduce work-related stressors and improve organizational resources to enable workers to improve their overall psychological and physical health.

Concluding Remarks

Future research.

One of the areas requiring more theoretical and practical attention is that of the utility of stress frameworks to guide organizational development change interventions. Although it has been proposed that the foundation for work stress management interventions is in organizational development, and even though scholars and practitioners of organization development were also founders of research programs that focused on employee health and well-being or work stress, there are few studies or other theoretical works that link the two bodies of literature.

A second area that requires additional attention is the efficacy of stress management interventions across cultures. In examining secondary stress management interventions (i.e., coping), some cross-cultural differences in findings were described; however, there is still a dearth of literature from different countries on the utility of different prevention, coping, and stress management strategies.

A third area that has been blossoming since the start of the 21st century is the topic of hindrance and challenge stressors and the implications of both on workers’ well-being and performance. More research is needed on this topic in several areas. First, there is little consistency by which researchers label a stressor as a hindrance or a challenge. Researchers sometimes take liberties with labels, but it is not the researchers who should label a stressor but the study participants themselves who should indicate if a stressor is a source of strain. Rodríguez, Kozusznik, and Peiró ( 2013 ) developed a measure in which respondents indicate whether a stressor is a challenge or a hindrance. Just as some people may perceive demands to be challenges that they savor and that result in a psychological state of eustress (Nelson & Simmons, 2003 ), others find them to be constraints that impede goal fulfillment and thus might experience distress. Likewise, some people might perceive ambiguity as a challenge that can be overcome and others as a constraint over which he or she has little control and few or no resources with which to cope. More research on validating the measurement of challenge vs. hindrance stressors, as well as eustress vs. distress, and savoring vs. coping, is warranted. Second, at what point are challenge stressors harmful? Just because people experiencing challenge stressors continue to perform well, it does not necessarily mean that they are healthy people. A great deal of stressors are intellectually stimulating, but excessive stimulation can also take a toll on one’s physiological well-being, as evident by the droves of professionals experiencing different kinds of diseases not experienced as much a few decades ago, such as obesity (Fried et al., 2013 ). Third, which stress management interventions would better serve to reduce hindrance stressors or to reduce strain that may result from challenge stressors while reinforcing engagement-producing challenge stressors?

A fourth area that requires additional attention is that of the flexible work arrangements (FWAs). One of the reasons companies have been willing to permit employees to work from home is not so much out of concern for the employee, but out of the company’s need for the focal person to be able to communicate with a colleague working from a geographic region when it is night or early morning for the focal person. Glazer, Kożusznik, and Shargo ( 2012 ) presented several areas for future research on this topic, noting that by participating on global virtual teams, workers face additional stressors, even while given flexibility of workplace and work time. As noted earlier, more research needs to be done on the extent to which people who take advantage of FWAs are advantaged in terms of detachment from work. Can people working from home detach? Are those who find their work invigorating also likely to experience ill-health by not detaching from work?

A fifth area worthy of further research attention is workplace wellness programing. According to Page and Vella-Brodrick ( 2009 ), “subjective and psychological well-being [are] key criteria for employee mental health” (p. 442), whereby mental health focuses on wellness, rather than the absence of illness. They assert that by fostering employee mental health, organizations are supporting performance and retention. Employee well-being can be supported by ensuring that jobs are interesting and meaningful, goals are achievable, employees have control over their work, and skills are used to support organizational and individual goals (Dewe & Kompier, 2008 ). However, just as mental health is not the absence of illness, work stress is not indicative of an absence of psychological well-being. Given the perspective that employee well-being is a state of mind (Page & Vella-Brodrick, 2009 ), we suggest that employee well-being can be negatively affected by noxious job stressors that cannot be remediated, but when job stressors are preventable, employee well-being can serve to protect an employee who faces job stressors. Thus, wellness programs ought to focus on providing positive experiences by enhancing and promoting health, as well as building individual resources. These programs are termed “green cape” interventions (Pawelski, 2016 ). For example, with the growing interests in positive psychology, researchers and practitioners have suggested employing several positive psychology interventions, such as expressing gratitude, savoring experiences, and identifying one’s strengths (Tetrick & Winslow, 2015 ). Another stream of positive psychology is psychological capital, which includes four malleable functions of self-efficacy, optimism, hope, and resilience (Luthans, Youssef, & Avolio, 2007 ). Workplace interventions should include both “red cape” interventions (i.e., interventions to reduce negative experiences) and “green cape” interventions (i.e., workplace wellness programs; Polly, 2014 ).

A Healthy Organization’s Pledge

A healthy workplace requires healthy workers. Period. Among all organizations’ missions should be the focus on a healthy workforce. To maintain a healthy workforce, the company must routinely examine its own contributions in terms of how it structures itself; reinforces communications among employees, vendors, and clients; how it rewards and cares for its people (e.g., ensuring they get sufficient rest and can detach from work); and the extent to which people at the upper levels are truly connected with the people at the lower levels. As a matter of practice, management must recognize when employees are overworked, unwell, and poorly engaged. Management must also take stock of when it is doing well and right by its contributors’ and maintain and reinforce the good practices, norms, and procedures. People in the workplace make the rules; people in the workplace can change the rules. How management sees its employees and values their contribution will have a huge role in how a company takes stock of its own pain points. Providing employees with tools to manage their own reactions to work-related stressors and consequent strains is fine, but wouldn’t it be grand if organizations took better notice about what they could do to mitigate the strain-producing stressors in the first place and take ownership over how employees are treated?

• Abramis, D. J. (1994). Work role ambiguity, job satisfaction, and job performance: Meta-analyses and review. Psychological Report, 75 , 1411–1433.
• Adams, G. A. , & Jex, S. M. (1999). Relationships between time management, control, work–family conflict, and strain. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 1 , 72–77.
• Alloy, L. B. , & Abramson, L. Y. (1979). Judgment of contingency in depressed and nondepressed students: Sadder but wiser? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 108 , 441–483.
• Amstad, F. T. , Meier, L. L. , Fasel, U. , Elfering, A. , & Semmer, N. K. (2011). A meta-analysis of work-family conflict and various outcomes with a special emphasis on cross-domain versus matching-domain relations. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 16 , 151–169.
• Assouline, M. , & Meir, E. I. (1987). Meta-analysis of the relationship between congruence and well-being measures. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 31 , 319–332.
• Aust, B. , & Ducki, A. (2004). Comprehensive health promotion interventions at the workplace: Experiences with health circles in Germany. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 9 , 258–270.
• Bakker, A. B. Demerouti, E. , Sanz-Vergel, A. I. (2014). Burnout and work engagement: The JD-R approach. Annual Review of Organizational Behavior, 1 , 389–411.
• Bakker, A. B. , van Veldhoven, M. J. P. M. , & Xanthopoulou, D. (2010). Beyond the demand-control model: Thriving on high job demands and resources. Journal of Personnel Psychology, 9 , 3–16.
• Beehr, T. A. , Glaser, K. M. , Canali, K. G. , & Wallwey, D. A. (2001). Back to basics: Re-examination of demand control theory of occupational stress. Work & Stress, 15 , 115–130.
• Beehr, T. A. , & Glazer, S. (2001). A cultural perspective of social support in relation to occupational stress. In P. Perrewé , D. C. Ganster , & J. Moran (Eds.), Research in occupational stress and well-being (pp. 97–142). Amsterdam: JAI Press.
• Bergman, M. E. , Palmieri, P. A. , Drasgow, F. , & Ormerod, A. J. (2012). Racial/ethnic harassment and discrimination, its antecedents, and its effect on job-related outcomes. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 17 , 65–78.
• Bhagat, R. S. , Krishnan, B. , Nelson, T. A. , Leonard, K. M. , Ford, D. J. , & Billing, T. K. (2010). Organizational stress, psychological strain, and work outcomes in six national contexts: A closer look at the moderating influences of coping styles and decision latitude . Cross Cultural Management, 17 , 10–29.
• Bhagat, R. S. , O’Driscoll, M. P. , Babakus, E. , Frey, L. , Chokkar, J. , Ninokumar, B. H , et al. (1994). Organizational stress and coping in seven national contexts: A cross-cultural investigation . In G. P. Keita & J. J. Hurrell (Eds.), Job stress in a changing workforce: Investigating gender, diversity, and family issues (pp. 93–105). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Bhagat, R. S. , Segovis, J. C. , & Nelson, T. A. (2012). Work stress and coping in the era of globalization . New York: Routledge.
• Billings, A. G. , & Moos, R. H. (1981). The role of coping responses and social resources in attenuating the stress of life events. Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 4 , 139–157.
• Birnie, K. , Speca, M. , & Carlson, L. E. (2010). Exploring self-compassion and empathy in the context of mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR). Stress & Health, 26 , 359–371.
• Biron, C. , Gatrell, C. , & Cooper, C. L. (2010). Autopsy of a failure: Evaluating process and contextual issues in an organizational-level work stress intervention. International Journal of Stress Management, 17 , 135–158.
• Bowling, N. A. , & Kirkendall, C. (2012). Workload: A review of causes, consequences, and potential interventions. In J. Houdmont , S. Leka , & R. Sinclair (Eds.), Contemporary occupational health psychology (Vol. 2) (pp. 221–238). Chichester, U.K.: Wiley.
• Breaugh, J. A. , & Colihan, J. P. (1994). Measuring facets of job ambiguity: Construct validity evidence. Journal of Applied Psychology, 79 , 191–202.
• Bruk-Lee, V. , & Spector, P. E. (2006). The social stressors-counterproductive work behaviors link: Are conflicts with supervisors and coworkers the same? . Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 11 , 145–156.
• Cancelliere, C. , Cassidy, J. D. , Ammendolia, C. , & Côte, P. (2011). Are workplace health promotion programs effective at improving presenteeism in workers? A systematic review and best evidence synthesis of the literature. BMC Public Health, 11 , 395–406.
• Caplan, R. D. (1987). Person–environment fit in organizations: Theories, facts, and values. In A. W. Riley & S. J. Zaccaro (Eds.), Occupational stress and organizational effectiveness (pp. 103–140). New York: Praeger.
• Cartwright, S. , & Cooper, C. L. (2005). Individually targeted interventions. In J. Barling , E. K. Kelloway , & M. R. Frone (Eds.), Handbook of work stress (pp. 607–622). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
• Cavanaugh, M. A. , Boswell, W. R. , Roehling, M. V. , & Boudreau, J. W. (2000). An empirical examination of self-reported work stress among U.S. managers . Journal of Applied Psychology, 85 , 65–74.
• Chong, D. S. F. , van Eerde, W. , Rutte, C. G. , & Chai, K. H. (2012). Bringing employees closer: The effect of proximity on communication when teams function under time pressure. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 29 , 205–215.
• Chrobot-Mason, D. , & Leslie, J. B. (2012). The role of multicultural competence and emotional intelligence in managing diversity. Psychologist-Manager Journal, 15 , 219–236.
• Cilliers, F. (2011). Individual diversity management and salutogenic functioning. International Review of Psychiatry, 23 , 501–507.
• Claessens, B. C. , Van Eerde, W. , Rutte, C. G. , & Roe, R. A. (2004). Planning behavior and perceived control of time at work . Journal of Organizational Behavior, 25 , 937–950.
• Cooper, C. L. , Dewe, P. D. , & O’Driscoll, M. P. (2011). Employee assistance programs: Strengths, challenges, and future roles. In J. C. Quick , L. E. Tetrick , J. C. Quick , L. E. Tetrick (Eds.), Handbook of occupational health psychology (2d ed.) (pp. 337–356). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Cooper, C. L. , Dewe, P. J. , & O’Driscoll, M. P. (2001). Organizational stress: A review and critique of theory, research, and applications . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
• Coovert, M. D. & Thompson, L. F. (2003). Technology and workplace health. In J. C. Quick & L. E. Tetrick (Eds.), Handbook of occupational health psychology (pp. 221–241). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Dawson, K. M. , O’Brien, K. E. , & Beehr, T. A. (2016). The role of hindrance stressors in the job demand-control-support model of occupational stress: A proposed theory revision . Journal of Organizational Behavior, 37 (3), 397–415.
• Dewe, P. , & Kompier, M. (2008). Foresight mental capital and wellbeing project: Wellbeing and work: Future challenges . London: The Government Office for Science.
• Dopkeen, J. C. , & DuBois, R. (2014). Stress in the workplace: A policy synthesis on its dimensions and prevalence . White paper. University of Illinois Chicago, Center for Employee Health Studies, School of Public Health.
• Dwyer, D. J. , & Ganster, D. C. (1991). The effects of job demands and control on employee attendance and satisfaction. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 12 , 595–608.
• Ebunlomo, E. O. , Hare-Everline, N. , Weber, A. , & Rich, J. (2015). Development of a comprehensive 12-week health promotion program for Houston Airport System. Texas Public Health Journal, 67 (1), 11–13.
• Edwards, J. R. (2008). Person-environment fit in organizations: An assessment of theoretical progress. The Academy of Management Annals, 2 , 167–230.
• Etzion, D. , Eden, D. , & Lapidot, Y. (1998). Relief from job stressors and burnout: Reserve service as a respite. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83 , 577–585.
• Firth-Cozens, J. (2003). Doctors, their wellbeing, and their stress: It’s time to be proactive about stress—and prevent it. British Medical Journal, 326 , 670–671.
• Flaxman, P. E. , & Bond, F. W. (2010). Worksite stress management training: Moderated effects and clinical significance. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 15 , 347–358.
• Folkman, S. , & Lazarus, R. S. (1980). An analysis of coping in a middle-aged community sample . Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 21 , 219–239.
• French, J. R. P., Jr. , & Caplan, R. D. (1972). Organizational stress and individual strain. In A. Marrow (Ed.), The failure of success . New York: AMACOM.
• French, J. R. P., Jr. , & Kahn, R. L. (1962). A programmatic approach to studying the industrial environment and mental health. Journal of Social Issues, 18 , 1–48.
• French, S. (2015, May 27). PCS workload and work-life balance survey 2013 . London: Public and Commercial Services Union.
• Fried, Y. , Laurence, G. A. , Shirom, A. , Melamed, S. , Toker, S. , Berliner, S. , & Shapira, I. (2013). The relationship between job enrichment and abdominal obesity: A longitudinal field study of apparently healthy individuals. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 18 , 458–468.
• Frone, M. R. (2000). Interpersonal conflict at work and psychological outcomes: Testing a model among young workers. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 5 , 246–255.
• Giga, S. I. , Cooper, C. L. , & Faragher, B. (2003). The development of a framework for a comprehensive approach to stress management interventions at work. International Journal of Stress Management, 10 , 280–296.
• Glazer, S. (2008). Cross-cultural issues in stress and burnout. In J. R. B. Halbesleben (Ed.), Handbook of Stress and Burnout in Health Care (pp. 79–93). Huntington, NY: Nova Science Publishers.
• Glazer, S. , & Beehr, T. A. (2005). Consistency of the implications of three role stressors across four countries. Journal of Organizational Behavior , 26 , 467–487.
• Glazer, S. , Kożusznik, M. W. , Meyers, J. H. , & Ganai, O. (2014). Cultural implications of meaningfulness as a resource to mitigate work stress. In S. Leka & R. Sinclair (Eds.), Contemporary occupational health psychology: Global perspectives on research and practice (Vol. 3) (pp. 114–130). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
• Glazer, S. , Kożusznik, M. W. , & Shargo, I. A. (2012). Global virtual teams: A cure for- or a cause of- stress. In P. L. Perrewé , J. Halbesleben , & C. Rosen (Eds.), Research in occupational stress and well being: The role of the economic context on occupational stress and well being (Vol. 10, pp. 213–266). Bingley, U.K.: Emerald.
• Glazer, S. , Stetz, T. A. , & Izso, L. (2004). Effects of personality on subjective job stress: A cultural analysis. Personality and Individual Differences, 37 , 645–658.
• Greenhaus, J. H. , & Beutell, N. J. (1985). Sources of conflict between work and family roles. Academy of Management Review, 10 , 76–88.
• Hackman, J. R. , & Oldham, G. R. (1980). Work Redesign . Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
• Hauke, A. , Flintrop, J. , Brun, E. , & Rugulies, R. (2011). The impact of work-related psychosocial stressors on the onset of musculoskeletal disorders in specific body regions: A review and meta-analysis of 54 longitudinal studies . Work & Stress, 25 , 243–256.
• Health & Safety Executive (n.d.). Cardiff and Value University Health Board—A stress case study .
• Heron, K. E. , & Smyth, J. M. (2010). Ecological momentary interventions: Incorporating mobile technology into psychosocial and health behaviour treatments. British Journal of Health Psychology, 15 , 1–39.
• Hershcovis, M. (2011). “Incivility, social undermining, bullying … oh my!”: A call to reconcile constructs within workplace aggression research . Journal of Organizational Behavior, 32 , 499–519.
• Higgins, J. E. , & Endler, N. S. (1995). Coping, life stress, and psychological and somatic distress . European Journal of Personality, 9 , 253–270.
• Hobfoll, S. E. (1989). Conservation of resources: A new attempt at conceptualizing stress. American Psychologist, 44 , 513–524.
• Hobfoll, S. E. (1998). Stress, culture, and community: The psychology and philosophy of stress . New York: Plenum Press.
• Hobfoll, S. E. (2001). The influence of culture, community, and the nested-self in the stress process: Advancing Conservation of Resources Theory. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 50 , 337–421.
• International Labor Organization (2012, July 5). Why stress at work matters . International Labor Organization.
• International Labor Organization (n.d.). Psychosocial risks and work-related stress . International Labor Organization.
• Jackson, S. E. , & Schuler, R. S. (1985). A meta-analysis and conceptual critique of research on role ambiguity and role conflict in work settings. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 36 , 16–78.
• Jayson, S. (2012, January 11). Yeah, we’re stressed but dealing with it; Americans report a decrease in stress for the first time in five years, maybe because it’s just the new normal . USA Today .
• Jex, S. M. , & Beehr, T. A. (1991). Emerging theoretical and methodological issues in the study of work-related stress. Research in Personnel and Human Resources Management, 9 , 311–365.
• Jex, S. M. , & Elaqua, T. C. (1999). Time management as a moderator of relations between stressors and employee strain. Work & Stress, 13 , 182–191.
• Johnson, J. V. , & Hall, E. M. (1988). Job strain, workplace social support, and cardiovascular disease: A cross-sectional study of a random sample of the Swedish working population. American Journal of Public Health, 78 , 1336–1342.
• Kahn, R. L. , Wolfe, D. M. , Quinn, R. P. , Snoek, J. D. , & Rosenthal, R. A. (1964). Organizational stress: Studies in role conflict and ambiguity . New York: Wiley.
• Kannampallil, T. G. , Waicekauskas, K. , Morrow, D. G. , Kopren, K. M. , & Fu, W. (2013). External tools for collaborative medication scheduling. Cognition, Technology & Work, 15 , 121–131.
• Karasek, R. A. (1979). Job demands, job decision latitude, and mental strain: Implications for job redesign. Administrative Science Quarterly , 24 , 285–308.
• Karasek, R. A. , & Theorell, T. (1990). Healthy work: Stress, productivity, and the reconstruction of working life . New York: Basic Books.
• van der Klink, J. J. L. , Blonk, R. W. B. , Schene, A. H. , & van Dijk, F. J. H. (2001). The benefits of interventions for work-related stress. American Journal of Public Health, 91 , 270–276.
• Knight, B. G. , Silverstein, M. , McCallum, T. J. , & Fox, L. S. (2000). A sociocultural stress and coping model for mental health outcomes among African American caregivers in southern California . The Journals of Gerontology: Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 55B , 142–150.
• Kossek, E. E. , Thompson, R. J. , Lautsch, B. A. (2015). Balanced workplace flexibility: Avoiding the traps. California Management Review, 57 , 5–25.
• Kożusznik, M. , Rodriguez, I. , & Peiró, J. M. (2012). Cross-national outcomes of stress appraisal. Cross Cultural Management, 19 , 507–525.
• Kożusznik, M. , Rodriguez, I. , & Peiró, J. M. (2015). Eustress and distress climates in teams: Patterns and outcomes. International Journal of Stress Management, 22 , 1–23.
• Kristof-Brown, A. L. , Zimmerman, R. D. , & Johnson, E. C. (2005). Consequences of individuals’ fit at work: A meta-analysis of person-job, person-organization, person-group, and person-supervisor fit. Personnel Psychology, 58 , 281–342.
• LaMontagne, A. D. , Keegel, T. , Louie, A. M. , Ostry, A. , & Landsbergis, P. A. (2007). A systematic review of the job-stress intervention evaluation literature, 1990–2005. International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health, 13 , 268–280.
• LaRocco, J. M. , Tetrick, L. E. , & Meder, D. (1989). Differences in perceptions of work environment conditions, job attitudes, and health beliefs among military physicians, dentists, and nurses. Military Psychology, 1 , 135–151.
• Lazarus, R. S. , & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, appraisal, and coping . New York: Springer.
• Lazarus, R. S. , & Folkman, S. (1991). The concept of coping. In A. Monat & R. S. Lazarus (Eds.), Stress and coping: An anthology (3d ed.) (pp. 189–206). New York: Columbia University Press.
• LePine, J. A. , Podsakoff, N. P. , & LePine, M. A. (2005). A meta-analytic test of the challenge stressor-hindrance stressor framework: An explanation for inconsistent relationships among stressors and performance. Academy of Management Journal, 48 , 764–775.
• Lewin, K. (1936). Principles of topological psychology . New York: McGraw-Hill.
• Lewin K. (1951). Field theory in social science . New York: Harper and Row.
• Lewin, K. (1997). Resolving social conflicts & Field theory in social science . Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Previously published in 1948 and 1951.
• Lin, B. C. , Kain, J. M. , & Fritz, C. (2013). Don’t interrupt me! An examination of the relationship between intrusions at work and employee strain. International Journal of Stress Management, 20 , 77–94.
• Liu, C. , & Li, H. (2017) Stressor and stressor appraisals: The moderating effect of task efficacy . Journal of Business and Psychology , 1–14.
• Liu, C. , Liu, Y. , Spector, P. E. , Shi, L. (2011). The interaction of job autonomy and conflict with supervisor in China and the United States: A qualitative and quantitative comparison. International Journal of Stress Management, 18 , 222–245.
• Liu, C. , Spector, P. E. , & Shi, L. (2007). Cross-national job stress: A quantitative and qualitative study. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 28 , 209–239.
• Luckhaupt, S. E. , Tak, S. , Calvert, G. M. (2010). The prevalence of short sleep duration by industry and occupational in the National Health Interview Survey. Sleep, 33 , 149–159.
• Luthans, F. , Youssef, C. M. , & Avolio, B. J. (2007). Psychological capital: Developing the human competitive edge . New York: Oxford University Press.
• Macan, T. H. (1994). Time management: Test of a process model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 79 , 381–391.
• Macan, T. H. , Shahani, C. , Dipboye, R. L. , & Philips, A. P. (1990). College students’ time management: Correlations with academic performance and stress. Journal of Educational Psychology, 82 , 760–768.
• Masuda, A. D. , Poelmans, S. A. Y. , Allen, T. D. , Spector, P. E. , Lapierre, L. M. , Cooper, C. L. , et al. (2012). Flexible work arrangements availability and their relationship with work-to-family conflict, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions: A comparison of three country clusters. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 61 , 1–29.
• McMahon, M. (2007). Think you might be addicted to email? You’re not alone . AOL.
• Monat, A. , & Lazarus, R. S. (Eds.). (1991). Stress and coping: An anthology (3d ed.). New York: Columbia University Press.
• Morimoto, H. , Shimada, H. , & Ozaki, K. (2013). Does stressor evaluation mediate sociocultural influence on coping selection? An investigation using Japanese employees. International Journal of Stress Management, 20 , 1–19.
• Narayanan, L. , Menon, S. , & Spector, P. E. (1999). A cross-cultural comparison of job stressors and reactions among employees holding comparable jobs in two countries. International Journal of Stress Management, 6 , 197–212.
• National Sleep Foundation (2005). Segment profiles . National Sleep Foundation.
• National Sleep Foundation (2013). How much sleep do adults need? . National Sleep Foundation.
• Nelson, D. L. , & Simmons, B. L. (2003). Health psychology and work stress: A more positive approach. In J. C. Quick & L. E. Tetrick (Eds.), Handbook of Occupational Health Psychology (pp. 97–119). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Norris, P. A. , Fahrion, S. L. , & Oikawa, L. O. (2007). Autogenic biofeedback training in psychophysiological therapy and stress management. In P. M. Lehrer , R. L. Woolfolk , & W. E. Sime (Eds.), Principles and practices of stress management (3d ed., pp. 175–205). New York: Guilford.
• Ogawa, N. (2009). Stress, coping behavior, and social support in Japan and the United States. Dissertation Abstracts International Section A , 69 , 3802.
• Oksanen, K. , & Ståhle, P. (2013). Physical environment as a source for innovation: Investigating the attributes of innovative space. Journal of Knowledge Management, 17 , 815–827.
• Page, K. M. , & Vella-Brodrick, D. A. (2009). The “what,” “why” and “how” of employee well-being: A new model. Social Indicators Research, 90 , 441–458.
• Parasuraman, S. , & Cleek, M. A. (1984). Coping behaviors and managers’ affective reactions to role stressors . Journal of Vocational Behavior, 24 , 179–193.
• Parasuraman, S. , & Purohit, Y. S. (2000). Distress and boredom among orchestra musicians: The two faces of stress. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 5 , 74–83.
• Pawelski, J. O. (2016). Defining the “positive” in positive psychology: Part II. A normative analysis . Journal of Positive Psychology, 11 , 357–365.
• Pearlin, L. I. , & Schooler, C. (1978). The structure of coping . Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 19 , 2–21.
• Peeters, M. A. G. , & Rutte, C. G. (2005). Time management behavior as a moderator for the job demand-control interaction. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology , 1 , 64–75.
• Peters, L. H. , & O’Connor, E. J. (1980). Situational constraints and work outcomes: The influence of a frequently overlooked construct. Academy of Management Review , 5, 391–397.
• Peters, L. H. , & O’Connor, E. J. (1988). Measuring work obstacles: Procedures, issues, and implications. In F. D. Schoorman & B. Schneider (Eds.), Facilitating work effectiveness (pp. 105–123). Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.
• Polly, S. (2014, July 2). Workplace well-being is not an oxymoron . Positive Psychology News Daily .
• Quick, C. J. , Quick, J. D. , Nelson, D. L. , & Hurrell, J. J. (2003). Preventive stress management in organizations . Washington, DC: APA.
• Quillian-Wolever, R. E. , & Wolever, M. E. (2003). Stress management at work . In J. C. Quick & L. E. Tetrick (Eds.), Handbook of occupational health psychology (pp. 355–375). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Ragsdale, J. M. , Beehr, T. A. , Grebner, S. , & Han, K. (2011). An integrated model of weekday stress and weekend recovery of students. International Journal of Stress Management, 18 , 153–180.
• Richardson, K. M. , & Rothstein, H. R. (2008). Effects of occupational stress management intervention programs: A meta-analysis. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 13 , 69–93.
• Rodríguez, I. , Kozusznik, M. W. , & Peiró, J. M. (2013). Development and validation of the Valencia Eustress-Distress Appraisal Scale. International Journal of Stress Management, 20 , 279–308.
• Rothbaum, F. , Weisz, J. R. , & Snyder, S. S. (1982). Changing the world and changing the self: A two-process model of perceived control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42 , 5–37.
• Rotter, J. B. (1966). Generalized expectancies for internal versus external control of reinforcement. Psychological Monographs, 80 , 609.
• Rousseau, V. , & Aubé, C. (2010). Social support at work and affective commitment to the organization: The moderating effect of job resource adequacy and ambient conditions. Journal of Social Psychology, 150 , 321–340.
• Saunders, T. , Driskell, J. E. , Johnston, J. , & Salas, E. (1996). The effect of stress inoculation training on anxiety and performance. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 1 , 170–186.
• Schaubroeck, J. , Ganster, D. C. , Sime, W. E. , & Ditman, D. (1993). A field experiment testing supervisory role clarification. Personnel Psychology, 46 , 1–25.
• Selmer, J. (2002). Coping strategies applied by Western vs overseas Chinese business expatriates in China. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 13 , 19–34.
• Siegrist, J. (1996). Adverse health effects of high effort/low reward conditions. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 1 , 27–41.
• Siegrist, J. (2010). Effort-reward imbalance at work and cardiovascular diseases. International Journal of Occupational Medicine and Environmental Health, 23 , 279–285.
• Siegrist, J. , Dragano, N. , Nyberg, S. T. , Lunau, T. , Alfredsson, L. , Erbel, R. , et al. (2014). Validating abbreviated measures of effort-reward imbalance at work in European cohort studies: The IPD-Work consortium. International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, 87 , 249–256.
• Sinha, B. K. , Willson, L. R. , & Watson, D. C. (2000). Stress and coping among students in India and Canada . Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science/Revue Canadienne Des Sciences Du Comportement , 32 (4), 218–225.
• Sinnott, J. , & Vatz, R. E. (2015, March 13). Maryland doesn’t trust state employees to manage their health . Baltimore Sun .
• Siu, O. L. , Cooper, C. L. , & Phillips, D. R. (2013, July 1). Intervention studies on enhancing work well-being, reducing burnout, and improving recovery experiences among Hong Kong health care workers and teachers . International Journal of Stress Management, 21 , 69–84.
• Sonnentag, S. (2012). Psychological detachment from work during leisure time: The benefits of mentally disengaging from work. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 21 , 114–118.
• Sørensen, O. H. , & Holman, D. (2014). A participative intervention to improve employee well-being in knowledge work jobs: A mixed-methods evaluation study. Work & Stress, 28 , 67–86.
• Spector, P. E. , Chen, P. Y. , & O’Connell, B. J. (2000). A longitudinal study of relations between job stressors and job strains while controlling for prior negative affectivity and strains. Journal of Applied Psychology, 85 , 211–218.
• Spector, P. E. , & Jex, S. M. (1998). Development of four self-report measures of job stressors and strains: Interpersonal Conflict at Work Scale, Organizational Constraints Scale, Quantitative Workload Inventory, and Physical Symptoms Inventory. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 3 , 356–367.
• State of Maryland . (n.d.). Wellness program frequently asked questions . Maryland.gov.
• Strentz, T. , & Auerbach, S. M. (1988). Adjustment to the stress of simulated captivity: Effects of emotion-focused versus problem-focused preparation on hostages differing in locus of control . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 55 , 652–660.
• Swanberg, J. E. , McKechnie, S. P. , Ojha, M. U. , & James, J. B. (2011). Schedule control, supervisor support and work engagement: A winning combination for workers in hourly jobs? Journal of Vocational Behavior, 79 , 613–624.
• Tarafdar, M. , Tu, Q. , Ragu-Nathan, B. S. , & Ragu-Nathan, T. , (2007). The impact of technostress on role stress and productivity. Journal of Management Information Systems, 24 , 301–328.
• Tepper, B. J. , & Henle, C. A. (2011). A case for recognizing distinctions among constructs that capture interpersonal mistreatment in work organizations . Journal of Organizational Behavior, 32 , 487–498.
• Tetrick, L. E. , & Winslow, C. J. (2015). Workplace stress management interventions and health promotion. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 2 , 583–603.
• Thomas, D. C. , Au, K. , & Ravlin, E. C. (2003). Cultural variation and the psychological contract. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 24 , 451–471.
• Toker, S. , Shirom, A. , Melamed, S. , & Armon, G. (2012). Work characteristics as predictors of diabetes incidence among apparently healthy employees. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 17 , 259–267.
• Velez, B. L. , Moradi, B. , & Brewster, M. E. (2013). Testing the tenets of minority stres theory in workplace contexts. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 60 , 532–542.
• Verquer, M. L. , Beehr, T. A. , & Wagner, S. H. (2003). A meta-analysis of relations between person–organization fit and work attitudes. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 63 , 473–489.
• Villani, D. , Grassi, A. , Cognetta, C. , Toniolo, D. , Cipresso, P. , & Riva, G. (2013). Self-help stress management training through mobile phones: An experience with oncology nurses. Psychological Services , 10 , 315–322.
• Vischer, J. C. (2007). The effects of the physical environment on job performance: Towards a theoretical model of workspace stress. Stress & Health, 23 , 175–184.
• Wasti, S. A. , & Cortina, L. M. (2002). Coping in context: Sociocultural determinants of responses to sexual harassment . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 83, 394–405.
• Willert, M. V. , Thulstrup, A. M. , Hertz, J. , & Bonde, J. P. (2010). Sleep and cognitive failures improved by a three-month stress management intervention . International Journal of Stress Management, 17 , 193–213.
• Xiao Q. , Ottosson I. , & Carlsson I. (2013). Stressors and coping strategies in Chinese and Swedish students at a Swedish university. Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology, 21 , 309–312.

Related Articles

• Work and Family
• Organizational Climate and Culture
• Physical Activity and Stress Reactivity
• The Roles of Psychological Stress, Physical Activity, and Dietary Modifications on Cardiovascular Health Implications
• Inflammation as a Biomarker Method in Lifespan Developmental Methodology
• Stress and Coping Theory Across the Adult Lifespan
• Occupational Health Psychology

Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Psychology. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a single article for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice).

date: 24 May 2024

• Cookie Policy
• Privacy Policy
• Legal Notice
• Accessibility
• [66.249.64.20|162.248.224.4]
• 162.248.224.4

Character limit 500 /500

• Abnormal Psychology
• Assessment (IB)
• Biological Psychology
• Cognitive Psychology
• Criminology
• Developmental Psychology
• Extended Essay
• General Interest
• Health Psychology
• Human Relationships
• IB Psychology
• IB Psychology HL Extensions
• Internal Assessment (IB)
• Love and Marriage
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
• Prejudice and Discrimination
• Qualitative Research Methods
• Research Methodology
• Revision and Exam Preparation
• Social and Cultural Psychology
• Studies and Theories
• Teaching Ideas

Emotion-focused vs. Problem-focused Coping Strategies

Travis Dixon March 14, 2022 Health Psychology

• Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
• Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)

Coping is “a person’s efforts to manage demands that are appraised as taxing or exceeding their resources.” (1) In other words, coping is how we try to deal with stress. It is a widely studied topic in psychology and there are over 400 categorized styles of coping. (2) These styles are commonly grouped into two distinct types:  problem focused vs. emotion-focused . In this post we’ll look at which strategy is better and why. 

This post is written with content adapted from our Student’s Guide to Stress for IB Health Psychology .

Problem-focused coping strategies aim to change or eliminate a stressor. If you adapt a strategy to try to deal with the stressor directly, you’re using problem-focused coping. For example, planning, problem-solving, or removing the stressor altogether are examples of problem focused coping. (3)

Emotion-focused coping is when you try to deal with your emotional response to the stressor. If you are trying to reduce, eliminate, or simply tolerate your emotional response to a stressor, then you’re using emotion-focused coping. Examples include withdrawal, letting out anger and frustration, emotional support seeking, distractions, rumination, and resignation acceptance (accepting the problem will always exist).

The general consensus among psychologists is that problem-focused coping is the more effective coping strategy because it’s consistently associated with lower stress levels and better mental health (4).   Similarly, people who use emotion-focused coping are more at risk for stress-related illnesses (e.g. heart disease) compared to those using problem-focused coping (5).

Coping strategies could explain gender differences in levels of perceived stress. Numerous studies have shown a tendency for females to use more emotion-focused coping whereas males use more problem focused coping (6)   When it comes to the study of teenagers and stress, however, there is “…limited research about what may affect adolescents’ perceptions of stressors from school, how they cope with such stressors, and how this differs from a gender perspective.” (7) Most of the research has been on adults. However, some researchers have studied connections between coping and mental health problems closely related to stress (e.g. depression) amongst teenagers. (8)

Key Study: Coping strategies in Italian teens (Cicognani, 2011)

Aim: To understand coping strategies and how they relate to mental health in teenagers.

Can you relate to the findings of this study? What advice can you take from it?

• Sample = 342 high school students (14-19 years old) in Northern Italy.
• Coping was measured using a questionnaire (Coping Across Situations Questionnaire – CASQ)
• Mental health was measured using a questionnaire on subjective well-being (including depressed mood).
• She also gathered data on levels of self-efficacy and social support.
• The results showed significant correlations between coping strategies and psychological well-being.
• expecting the worst (r =0.31),
• withdrawal (r = 0.37),
• and accepting that there will always be problems (r = 0.32).
• The results also showed that girls were more likely to use these emotion-focused coping strategies more than boys.
• Self-efficacy and family support influenced which coping strategies were used (e.g. reducing the use of emotion focused strategies like withdrawing) and this improved well-being.

Conclusions

• This shows how emotion-focused coping could have a negative effect on mental health.
• However, it also shows that factors like self-efficacy and social support can influence the choice of coping strategies and thus affect mental health also.
• The results could explain the common finding that girls report higher levels of subjective stress in stress studies.

These findings are consistent with other research that shows females tend to use more emotion-focused coping, which could explain gender differences in perceived stress and prevalence of stress-related mental health issues like anxiety and depression. However, factors like social support and self-efficacy can influence which coping strategy we use. Studies have shown that girls have reported having higher levels of emotional self-efficacy, whereas boys report higher levels of problem-solving self-efficacy (9).   Our self-efficacy influences our appraisal of our resources, so we’ll naturally use the coping strategy that we perceive to be our strength. This could be why boys and girls use different coping strategies.

Psychology is never as simple as A=B: while problem-focused coping is probably better, it’s not always the right answer. 

It is important to note, however, that people tend to use a mixture of both strategies. In a yearlong study of 100 participants, Folkman and Lazarus (1980) found that in 98% of stressful situations, their participants used a combination of both strategies. The stressor, who is involved, appraisals, gender, and age also influenced the strategies used. For example, people used more problem-focused coping at work and emotion-focused coping when it came to their health (10).

Similarly, it’s not a clear black-and-white answer regarding which coping strategy is better. For example, positive reappraisals could be considered an emotion-focused coping strategy and this is linked with positive health outcomes (11)  Th e effectiveness might also depend on the stressor: using a problem-focused approach for a stressor that is uncontrollable and unable to be changed could be less effective than an emotion-focused one.

Being able to cope effectively with stress involves understanding how to use a variety of different strategies and applying the relevant ones to the stressors in your life. This reminds me of the serenity prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.”

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” There is a lot of psychological research that supports the wisdom found in this simple prayer.

Copy from here for Critical Thinking Considerations

Critical Thinking Considerations

• While Cicognani’s study could be used to explain a link between coping and stress in teens, there’s a fundamental limitation in doing so. Can you see what it is?
• Assumptions : The above guiding question is based on the assumption that problem-focused coping is better than emotion-focused coping. However, this is not always the case. When might emotion-focused coping be the superior strategy? Can you apply this to specific examples in your life?
• An area of uncertainty is how to classify cognitive reappraisal. How might this be a problem-focused and/or an emotion-focused coping strategy? Austenfeld and Stanton(2004) have used the term ‘‘emotional approach coping” to describe active emotion regulation strategies such as cognitive reappraisal.

For more materials for IB Health Psychology, visit our store: https://store.themantic-education.com/

1Lazarus and Folkman, 1984; Peter Olusoga, Joanne Butt, Ian Maynard & Kate Hays (2010) Stress and Coping: A Study of World Class Coaches, Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 22:3, 274-293, DOI: 10.1080/10413201003760968

2 Skinner, E. A., Edge, K., Altman, J., & Sherwood, H. (2003). Searching for the structure of coping: a review and critique of category systems for classifying ways of coping. Psychological bulletin, 129(2), 216.

3 Carroll, L. (2013). Problem-focused coping. Encyclopedia of behavioral medicine, 1540-1541.; Herres, J. (2015). Adolescent coping profiles differentiate reports of depression and anxiety symptoms. Journal of affective disorders, 186, 312-319.

4 Penley, J. A., Tomaka, J., & Wiebe, J. S. (2002). !e association of coping to physical and psychological health outcomes: A meta-analytic review. Journal of behavioral medicine, 25(6), 551-603.

5 Chiavarino, C., Rabellino, D., Ardito, R. B., Cavallero, E., Palumbo, L., Bergerone, S., … & Bara, B. G. (2012). Emotional coping is a better predictor of cardiac prognosis than depression and anxiety. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 73(6), 473-475.; Bafghi, S. M. S., Ahmadi, N., Ardekani, S. M. Y., Jafari, L., Ardekani, B. B., Heydari, R., … & Faraji, R. (2018). A survey of coping strategies with stress in patients with acute myocardial infarction and individuals without a history of fixed myocardial infarction. Cardiology research, 9(1), 35.

6 Schoenmakers, E. C., van Tilburg, T. G., & Fokkema, T. (2015). Problem focused and emotion-focused coping options and loneliness: how are they related?. European Journal of Ageing, 12(2), 153-161.

7 Wilhsson, M., Svedberg, P., H  gdin, S., & Nygren, J. M. (2017). Strategies of adolescent girls and boys for coping with school-related stress. !e Journal of School Nursing, 33(5), 374-382.

8 Cicognani, E. (2011). Coping strategies with minor stressors in adolescence: Relationships with social support, self(efficacy, and psychological well(being. Journal of Applied social psychology, 41(3), 559-578.

9 Flores, F. J., Mayorga-Vega, D., Blanco, J. R., & Blanco, H. (2014). Perceived self-e#cacy in problem solving and scientiffc communication in university students. A gender study. Psychology, 2014.; McKay, M. T., Dempster, M., & Byrne, D. G. (2014). An examination of the relationship between self-e#cacy and stress in adolescents: the role of gender and selfesteem. Journal of youth studies, 17(9), 1131-1151.

10 Folkman, S., & Lazarus, R. S. (1980). An analysis of coping in a middleaged community sample. Journal of health and social behavior, 219-239.

11 Kelly, M. M., Tyrka, A. R., Price, L. H., & Carpenter, L. L. (2008). Sex differences in the use of coping strategies: predictors of anxiety and depressive symptoms. Depression and anxiety, 25(10), 839-846

“Coping” Skinner, EA and Zimmer-Gembeck, M. in Encyclopedia of Mental Health (Second Edition), 2016.

Herres, J. (2015). Adolescent coping pro%les differentiate reports of depression and anxiety symptoms. Journal of affective disorders, 186, 312-319.

Compas, B. E., Connor-Smith, J. K., Saltzman, H., !omsen, A. H., & Wadsworth, M. E. (2001). Coping with stress during childhood and adolescence: problems, progress, and potential in theory and research. Psychological bulletin, 127(1), 87.

Griffith, M. A., Dubow, E. F., & Ippolito, M. F. (2000). Developmental and cross-situational differences in adolescents’ coping strategies. Journal of youth and adolescence, 29(2), 183-204

Travis Dixon is an IB Psychology teacher, author, workshop leader, examiner and IA moderator.

Problem-Focused Coping: 10 Examples and Definition

Problem-focused coping refers to stress management strategies to deal with stress that involves directly confronting the source of stress to eliminate or decrease its impact.

This can involve developing a more constructive way of interpreting life events, formulating an action plan to build stress management skills, or modifying personal habits.

For example, a person who has a problem-focused coping orientation might write down their key obstacle and develop a list of actionable milestones for overcoming the problem.

Problem-Focused Coping Definition

Lazarus and Folkman (1984) make a distinction between problem-focused and emotion-focused coping :

“a distinction that we believe is of overriding importance, namely, between coping that is directed at managing or altering the problem causing the distress and coping that is directed at regulating emotional response to the problem” (p. 150).

Schoenmakers et al. (2015) defined problem-focused coping as:

“…all the active efforts to manage stressful situations and alter a troubled person-environment relationship to modify or eliminate the sources of stress via individual behavior” (p. 154).

Because stress is so damaging, every year since 2007, the American Psychological Association has commissioned an annual Stress in America survey.

And every year, the survey reveals that a majority of Americans have anxiety regarding numerous dimensions of life, including: concerns about the government, civil liberties , economic conditions, crime and violence, and the nation’s future.

Problem-Focused Coping Examples

• Identifying Sources of Stress: The first step to solving a problem is to know what it is. Therefore, making a list of specific events that create stress will allow a person to take the next step and devise a solution.
• Studying to Reduce Test Anxiety: Committing to studying at least 90-minutes a day during the week prior to an upcoming exam will reduce test anxiety by becoming better prepared.
• Changing Careers: When a person realizes that their job is a major source of stress, they may decide on a career change. Sometimes this can be accomplished right away, or may require returning to school.   
• Changing Social Circles: Spending time with people that are negative can create a lot of stress. So, changing the people in our circle of friends can eliminate a lot of stress from constantly being around so much negativity.  
• Hiring a Public Speaking Coach: Hiring a professional public speaking coach can help a person develop several techniques to improve one’s articulation and persuasiveness, ultimately leading to a more engaging presentation.  
• Changing Unhealthy Eating Habits: Food can have a tremendous impact on how we feel. Consuming healthy food makes the body feel good, which then helps reduce stress.
• Not Working on the Weekends: Feeling stressed and anxious 7 days a week is very destructive. Making a firm rule to now work on Saturday and Sundays will give you a break from the stress of work and keep your mind fresh and ready to go on Monday.
• Time Management: Managing time more efficiently improves productivity. Making a to-do list and prioritizing each task will allow a person to get more done in less time.  
• Going Back to School: Being passed over for promotion year after year can be difficult to endure. Improving one’s educational background can help a person become more qualified for advancement.  
• Learning to Say No: If a major source of stress is due to overwhelming job demands, then an effective strategy to reducing that stress is learning to say no when asked to do extra work.

Case Studies of Problem-Focused Coping    

1. setting boundaries.

Boundaries are rules that define the acceptable and unacceptable behaviors of the people in your life. Setting boundaries is a type of problem-focused self-care that lets others know how you expect to be treated. They can exist in one’s personal or professional relationships.

The first step to setting boundaries is to recognize that you have a right to be treated respectfully and fairly by others.

Second, as Erin Eatough, Ph.D. from BetterUp explains, “spend some time reflecting on the area of your life where you’re looking to set the boundary.” It’s better to start small, but focused on those areas that are important to you.”

Next, communicate your boundaries in a polite, but firm manner. This can be a little tricky.

Letting someone know they have over-stepped and made you feel uncomfortable can create quite the awkward moment.

However, Dr. Abigall Brenner from Psychology Today makes a valid point: “Most people will respect your boundaries when you explain what they are and will expect that you will do the same for them; it’s a two-way street.”

This is one reason it is best to set boundaries early in the relationship.

Finally, remember that setting boundaries is an ongoing exercise. People will come and go into your life, so become comfortable with the idea of setting boundaries. Learn to appreciate how it will help you have better relationships with those around you.

2. Coping Strategies and Loneliness  

Being lonely is a common experience among older adults in many Western countries. For example, according to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine ( NASEM ), approximately 30% of adults over 45 in the U. S. feel lonely.

To examine how coping strategies might alleviate loneliness, Schoenmakers et al. (2015) conducted face-to-face interviews with over 1,000 adults 61 – 99 years old that had participated in the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA).

Loneliness was measured and each participant was presented with 4 vignettes that described a person that was feeling lonely.

Participants were asked to indicate yes or no to six coping strategies, such as “Go to places or club meetings to meet people” (problem-focused), or “Keep in mind that other people are lonely as well, or even more lonely” (emotion-focused).

The results indicated that “persistently lonely older adults less frequently considered improving relationships and more frequently considered lowering expectations than their peers who had not experienced loneliness previously” (p. 159).

That is, they did not endorse problem-focused strategies, but did endorse emotion-focused strategies.

The researchers explain that “ongoing loneliness makes people abandon to look at options to improve relationships that are costly in time and energy. But because they still want to do something to alleviate their loneliness, they endorse lowering expectations” (p. 159).

3. Coping Strategies of College Students  

Stress among college students comes from a variety of sources. Of course, demanding courses and exams are prevalent. In addition, coping with the transition from secondary school to young adulthood involves being independent, handling finances, and adjusting to a new social environment . 

Coping strategies include talking to family and friends, leisure activities , and exercising, as well as less constructive activities such as alcohol consumption (Pierceall & Keim, 2007).

Broughman et al. (2009) surveyed 166 college students attending a liberal arts university in Southern California.

The survey included a coping inventory and measure of stress.

“Although college women reported the overall use of emotion-focused coping for stress, college men reported using emotion-focused coping for a greater number of specific stressors. For both women and men college students, problem-focused coping was used less than emotion-focused coping” (p. 93).

4.Marital Satisfaction of Families with Children with Disabilities

Having children creates both stress and joy in marital relations. While many might assume that having a child with a disability would lead to more stress, research over the last 4 decades has produced inconsistent findings ( Stoneman & Gavidia-Payne, 2006).

Stoneman and Gavidia-Payne (2006) surveyed 67 married couples with children with disabilities.

The survey included a measure of marital adjustment, occurrence of psychosocial stressors , and problem-focused coping strategies.

There were several interesting findings:

• “18.6% of the mothers and 22.9% of the fathers in the sample could be classified as maritally discordant” (p. 6). This is similar to percentages found in the general population.
• “Mothers reported significantly more daily hassles than did fathers” (p. 6).
• “Problem-focused coping did not differ by parent gender” (p. 6).
• “Marital adjustment for mothers was higher when mothers’ hassles/stressors were fewer and when fathers used more problem-focused coping strategies” (p. 7).
• “Fathers reported higher marital adjustment when they had fewer hassles and when they utilized more problem-focused coping strategies” (p. 7).

The researchers explain this pattern through a historical cultural lens :

“Women are more positive about their marriages when their husbands have strong problem-focused coping skills; husbands, on the other hand, do not place relevance on their wives problem-focused coping skills as they assess their marital adjustment” (p. 9).

5. Transactional Model of Stress and Coping

The Transactional Model of Stress and Coping was originally proposed by Lazarus and Folkman (1984). The model identifies a process that begins with the perception and interpretation of a life event, and concludes with a reappraisal of the individual’s coping strategy.

Lazarus and Folkman contend that not all stressors will be perceived. If perceived, then the stressor must be interpreted.  This interpretation occurs during Primary Appraisal . If the event is perceived as positive or irrelevant, then no stress will occur.

However, if the event is interpreted as dangerous, then a Secondary Appraisal will occur. The individual assesses if they have sufficient resources to overcome the stressor or not. If the answer is yes, then everything is fine.

If the answer is no, then a coping strategy is activated, which will either be problem-focused or emotion-focused.

After the coping strategy has been implemented, a Reappraisal of the situation will ensue and the process may be started all over again.

Problem-focused coping is when an individual engages in behavior to resolve a stressful situation. This can involve changing one’s situation, building skills, or other actions that are directly focused on addressing the root cause of the problem.

Research has shown that college students, married couples with and without children with disabilities, and the elderly experiencing loneliness, will engage in a combination of problem-focused and emotion-focused coping strategies.

The Transactional Model of Stress and Coping identifies the steps that individuals engage when encountering stressful life events.

Because stress is so prevalent in modern life, and is linked to major health conditions, it is a good idea to incorporate both problem- and emotion-focused coping strategies in one’s daily routine.

Brougham, R. R., Zail, C. M., Mendoza, C. M., & Miller, J. R. (2009). Stress, sex differences, and coping strategies among college students. Current Psychology, 28 , 85-97. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-009-9047-0

Lazarus, R. S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, appraisal, and coping. New York: Springer Publishing.

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2020. Social Isolation and Loneliness in Older Adults: Opportunities for the Health Care System . Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25663 .

Pierceall, E. A., & Keim, M. C. (2007). Stress and coping strategies among community college students. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 31 (9), 703-712. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/10668920600866579

Schoenmakers, E., van Tilburg, T., & Fokkema, T. (2015). Problem-focused and emotion-focused coping options and loneliness: How are they related? European Journal of Ageing, 12 , 153-161. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007%2Fs10433-015-0336-1

Stoneman, Z., & Gavidia-Payne, S. (2006). Marital adjustment in families of young children with disabilities: Associations with daily hassles and problem-focused coping. American Journal on Mental Retardation, 111 (1), 1-14. doi: https://doi.org/10.1352/0895-8017(2006)111[1:MAIFOY]2.0.CO;2

Appendix: Image Description

The image with alt text “graphical representation of the transactional model of stress” depicts a flow chart starting with “life event”. The next step is “perceptual process (event perceived/not perceived)”. If an event is perceived, we move on to the “primary appraisal (interpretation of perceived event)” step. Three options are presented: positive event, dangerous event, and irrelevant event. If it is perceived as a dangerous event, we move onto “secondary appraisal (analysis of available resources)”. Two options are presented: insufficient resources and sufficient resources. If insufficient resources are identified, we move onto the “stress coping strategy” step. The two options are problem-fcused and emotion-focused. The final step is reappraisal, where we apprause is the stragey was successful or failed. This flow chart is based on Lazarus and Folkman (1984).

Dave Cornell (PhD)

Dr. Cornell has worked in education for more than 20 years. His work has involved designing teacher certification for Trinity College in London and in-service training for state governments in the United States. He has trained kindergarten teachers in 8 countries and helped businessmen and women open baby centers and kindergartens in 3 countries.

• Dave Cornell (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/dave-cornell-phd/ 25 Positive Punishment Examples
• Dave Cornell (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/dave-cornell-phd/ 25 Dissociation Examples (Psychology)
• Dave Cornell (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/dave-cornell-phd/ 15 Zone of Proximal Development Examples
• Dave Cornell (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/dave-cornell-phd/ Perception Checking: 15 Examples and Definition

Chris Drew (PhD)

This article was peer-reviewed and edited by Chris Drew (PhD). The review process on Helpful Professor involves having a PhD level expert fact check, edit, and contribute to articles. Reviewers ensure all content reflects expert academic consensus and is backed up with reference to academic studies. Dr. Drew has published over 20 academic articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education and holds a PhD in Education from ACU.

• Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link 25 Positive Punishment Examples
• Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link 25 Dissociation Examples (Psychology)
• Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link 15 Zone of Proximal Development Examples
• Chris Drew (PhD) #molongui-disabled-link Perception Checking: 15 Examples and Definition

Leave a Comment Cancel Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

10 Best Problem-Solving Therapy Worksheets & Activities

Cognitive science tells us that we regularly face not only well-defined problems but, importantly, many that are ill defined (Eysenck & Keane, 2015).

Sometimes, we find ourselves unable to overcome our daily problems or the inevitable (though hopefully infrequent) life traumas we face.

Problem-Solving Therapy aims to reduce the incidence and impact of mental health disorders and improve wellbeing by helping clients face life’s difficulties (Dobson, 2011).

This article introduces Problem-Solving Therapy and offers techniques, activities, and worksheets that mental health professionals can use with clients.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Positive Psychology Exercises for free . These science-based exercises explore fundamental aspects of positive psychology, including strengths, values, and self-compassion, and will give you the tools to enhance the wellbeing of your clients, students, or employees.

This Article Contains:

What is problem-solving therapy, 14 steps for problem-solving therapy, 3 best interventions and techniques, 7 activities and worksheets for your session, fascinating books on the topic, resources from positivepsychology.com, a take-home message.

Problem-Solving Therapy assumes that mental disorders arise in response to ineffective or maladaptive coping. By adopting a more realistic and optimistic view of coping, individuals can understand the role of emotions and develop actions to reduce distress and maintain mental wellbeing (Nezu & Nezu, 2009).

“Problem-solving therapy (PST) is a psychosocial intervention, generally considered to be under a cognitive-behavioral umbrella” (Nezu, Nezu, & D’Zurilla, 2013, p. ix). It aims to encourage the client to cope better with day-to-day problems and traumatic events and reduce their impact on mental and physical wellbeing.

Clinical research, counseling, and health psychology have shown PST to be highly effective in clients of all ages, ranging from children to the elderly, across multiple clinical settings, including schizophrenia, stress, and anxiety disorders (Dobson, 2011).

Can it help with depression?

PST appears particularly helpful in treating clients with depression. A recent analysis of 30 studies found that PST was an effective treatment with a similar degree of success as other successful therapies targeting depression (Cuijpers, Wit, Kleiboer, Karyotaki, & Ebert, 2020).

Other studies confirm the value of PST and its effectiveness at treating depression in multiple age groups and its capacity to combine with other therapies, including drug treatments (Dobson, 2011).

The major concepts

Effective coping varies depending on the situation, and treatment typically focuses on improving the environment and reducing emotional distress (Dobson, 2011).

PST is based on two overlapping models:

Social problem-solving model

This model focuses on solving the problem “as it occurs in the natural social environment,” combined with a general coping strategy and a method of self-control (Dobson, 2011, p. 198).

The model includes three central concepts:

• Social problem-solving
• The problem
• The solution

The model is a “self-directed cognitive-behavioral process by which an individual, couple, or group attempts to identify or discover effective solutions for specific problems encountered in everyday living” (Dobson, 2011, p. 199).

Relational problem-solving model

The theory of PST is underpinned by a relational problem-solving model, whereby stress is viewed in terms of the relationships between three factors:

• Stressful life events
• Emotional distress and wellbeing
• Problem-solving coping

Therefore, when a significant adverse life event occurs, it may require “sweeping readjustments in a person’s life” (Dobson, 2011, p. 202).

• Enhance positive problem orientation
• Decrease negative orientation
• Foster ability to apply rational problem-solving skills
• Reduce the tendency to avoid problem-solving
• Minimize the tendency to be careless and impulsive

D’Zurilla’s and Nezu’s model includes (modified from Dobson, 2011):

• Initial structuring Establish a positive therapeutic relationship that encourages optimism and explains the PST approach.
• Assessment Formally and informally assess areas of stress in the client’s life and their problem-solving strengths and weaknesses.
• Obstacles to effective problem-solving Explore typically human challenges to problem-solving, such as multitasking and the negative impact of stress. Introduce tools that can help, such as making lists, visualization, and breaking complex problems down.
• Problem orientation – fostering self-efficacy Introduce the importance of a positive problem orientation, adopting tools, such as visualization, to promote self-efficacy.
• Problem orientation – recognizing problems Help clients recognize issues as they occur and use problem checklists to ‘normalize’ the experience.
• Problem orientation – seeing problems as challenges Encourage clients to break free of harmful and restricted ways of thinking while learning how to argue from another point of view.
• Problem orientation – use and control emotions Help clients understand the role of emotions in problem-solving, including using feelings to inform the process and managing disruptive emotions (such as cognitive reframing and relaxation exercises).
• Problem orientation – stop and think Teach clients how to reduce impulsive and avoidance tendencies (visualizing a stop sign or traffic light).
• Problem definition and formulation Encourage an understanding of the nature of problems and set realistic goals and objectives.
• Generation of alternatives Work with clients to help them recognize the wide range of potential solutions to each problem (for example, brainstorming).
• Decision-making Encourage better decision-making through an improved understanding of the consequences of decisions and the value and likelihood of different outcomes.
• Solution implementation and verification Foster the client’s ability to carry out a solution plan, monitor its outcome, evaluate its effectiveness, and use self-reinforcement to increase the chance of success.
• Guided practice Encourage the application of problem-solving skills across multiple domains and future stressful problems.
• Rapid problem-solving Teach clients how to apply problem-solving questions and guidelines quickly in any given situation.

Success in PST depends on the effectiveness of its implementation; using the right approach is crucial (Dobson, 2011).

Problem-solving therapy – Baycrest

The following interventions and techniques are helpful when implementing more effective problem-solving approaches in client’s lives.

First, it is essential to consider if PST is the best approach for the client, based on the problems they present.

Is PPT appropriate?

It is vital to consider whether PST is appropriate for the client’s situation. Therapists new to the approach may require additional guidance (Nezu et al., 2013).

Therapists should consider the following questions before beginning PST with a client (modified from Nezu et al., 2013):

• Has PST proven effective in the past for the problem? For example, research has shown success with depression, generalized anxiety, back pain, Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, and supporting caregivers (Nezu et al., 2013).
• Is PST acceptable to the client?
• Is the individual experiencing a significant mental or physical health problem?

All affirmative answers suggest that PST would be a helpful technique to apply in this instance.

Five problem-solving steps

The following five steps are valuable when working with clients to help them cope with and manage their environment (modified from Dobson, 2011).

Ask the client to consider the following points (forming the acronym ADAPT) when confronted by a problem:

• Attitude Aim to adopt a positive, optimistic attitude to the problem and problem-solving process.
• Define Obtain all required facts and details of potential obstacles to define the problem.
• Alternatives Identify various alternative solutions and actions to overcome the obstacle and achieve the problem-solving goal.
• Predict Predict each alternative’s positive and negative outcomes and choose the one most likely to achieve the goal and maximize the benefits.
• Try out Once selected, try out the solution and monitor its effectiveness while engaging in self-reinforcement.

If the client is not satisfied with their solution, they can return to step ‘A’ and find a more appropriate solution.

Download 3 Free Positive Psychology Exercises (PDF)

Enhance wellbeing with these free, science-based exercises that draw on the latest insights from positive psychology.

Download 3 Free Positive Psychology Tools Pack (PDF)

By filling out your name and email address below.

Positive self-statements

When dealing with clients facing negative self-beliefs, it can be helpful for them to use positive self-statements.

Use the following (or add new) self-statements to replace harmful, negative thinking (modified from Dobson, 2011):

• I can solve this problem; I’ve tackled similar ones before.
• I can cope with this.
• I just need to take a breath and relax.
• Once I start, it will be easier.
• It’s okay to look out for myself.
• I can get help if needed.
• Other people feel the same way I do.
• I’ll take one piece of the problem at a time.
• I can keep my fears in check.
• I don’t need to please everyone.

5 Worksheets and workbooks

Problem-solving self-monitoring form.

Answering the questions in the Problem-Solving Self-Monitoring Form provides the therapist with necessary information regarding the client’s overall and specific problem-solving approaches and reactions (Dobson, 2011).

Ask the client to complete the following:

• Describe the problem you are facing.
• What is your goal?
• What have you tried so far to solve the problem?
• What was the outcome?

Reactions to Stress

It can be helpful for the client to recognize their own experiences of stress. Do they react angrily, withdraw, or give up (Dobson, 2011)?

The Reactions to Stress worksheet can be given to the client as homework to capture stressful events and their reactions. By recording how they felt, behaved, and thought, they can recognize repeating patterns.

What Are Your Unique Triggers?

Helping clients capture triggers for their stressful reactions can encourage emotional regulation.

When clients can identify triggers that may lead to a negative response, they can stop the experience or slow down their emotional reaction (Dobson, 2011).

The What Are Your Unique Triggers ? worksheet helps the client identify their triggers (e.g., conflict, relationships, physical environment, etc.).

Problem-Solving worksheet

Imagining an existing or potential problem and working through how to resolve it can be a powerful exercise for the client.

Use the Problem-Solving worksheet to state a problem and goal and consider the obstacles in the way. Then explore options for achieving the goal, along with their pros and cons, to assess the best action plan.

Getting the Facts

Clients can become better equipped to tackle problems and choose the right course of action by recognizing facts versus assumptions and gathering all the necessary information (Dobson, 2011).

Use the Getting the Facts worksheet to answer the following questions clearly and unambiguously:

• Who is involved?
• What did or did not happen, and how did it bother you?
• Where did it happen?
• When did it happen?
• Why did it happen?
• How did you respond?

2 Helpful Group Activities

While therapists can use the worksheets above in group situations, the following two interventions work particularly well with more than one person.

Generating Alternative Solutions and Better Decision-Making

A group setting can provide an ideal opportunity to share a problem and identify potential solutions arising from multiple perspectives.

Use the Generating Alternative Solutions and Better Decision-Making worksheet and ask the client to explain the situation or problem to the group and the obstacles in the way.

Once the approaches are captured and reviewed, the individual can share their decision-making process with the group if they want further feedback.

Visualization

Visualization can be performed with individuals or in a group setting to help clients solve problems in multiple ways, including (Dobson, 2011):

• Clarifying the problem by looking at it from multiple perspectives
• Rehearsing a solution in the mind to improve and get more practice
• Visualizing a ‘safe place’ for relaxation, slowing down, and stress management

Guided imagery is particularly valuable for encouraging the group to take a ‘mental vacation’ and let go of stress.

Ask the group to begin with slow, deep breathing that fills the entire diaphragm. Then ask them to visualize a favorite scene (real or imagined) that makes them feel relaxed, perhaps beside a gently flowing river, a summer meadow, or at the beach.

The more the senses are engaged, the more real the experience. Ask the group to think about what they can hear, see, touch, smell, and even taste.

Encourage them to experience the situation as fully as possible, immersing themselves and enjoying their place of safety.

Such feelings of relaxation may be able to help clients fall asleep, relieve stress, and become more ready to solve problems.

We have included three of our favorite books on the subject of Problem-Solving Therapy below.

1. Problem-Solving Therapy: A Treatment Manual – Arthur Nezu, Christine Maguth Nezu, and Thomas D’Zurilla

This is an incredibly valuable book for anyone wishing to understand the principles and practice behind PST.

Written by the co-developers of PST, the manual provides powerful toolkits to overcome cognitive overload, emotional dysregulation, and the barriers to practical problem-solving.

Find the book on Amazon .

2. Emotion-Centered Problem-Solving Therapy: Treatment Guidelines – Arthur Nezu and Christine Maguth Nezu

Another, more recent, book from the creators of PST, this text includes important advances in neuroscience underpinning the role of emotion in behavioral treatment.

Along with clinical examples, the book also includes crucial toolkits that form part of a stepped model for the application of PST.

3. Handbook of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapies – Keith Dobson and David Dozois

This is the fourth edition of a hugely popular guide to Cognitive-Behavioral Therapies and includes a valuable and insightful section on Problem-Solving Therapy.

This is an important book for students and more experienced therapists wishing to form a high-level and in-depth understanding of the tools and techniques available to Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists.

For even more tools to help strengthen your clients’ problem-solving skills, check out the following free worksheets from our blog.

• Case Formulation Worksheet This worksheet presents a four-step framework to help therapists and their clients come to a shared understanding of the client’s presenting problem.
• Understanding Your Default Problem-Solving Approach This worksheet poses a series of questions helping clients reflect on their typical cognitive, emotional, and behavioral responses to problems.
• Social Problem Solving: Step by Step This worksheet presents a streamlined template to help clients define a problem, generate possible courses of action, and evaluate the effectiveness of an implemented solution.

If you’re looking for more science-based ways to help others enhance their wellbeing, check out this signature collection of 17 validated positive psychology tools for practitioners. Use them to help others flourish and thrive.

17 Top-Rated Positive Psychology Exercises for Practitioners

Expand your arsenal and impact with these 17 Positive Psychology Exercises [PDF] , scientifically designed to promote human flourishing, meaning, and wellbeing.

Created by Experts. 100% Science-based.

While we are born problem-solvers, facing an incredibly diverse set of challenges daily, we sometimes need support.

Problem-Solving Therapy aims to reduce stress and associated mental health disorders and improve wellbeing by improving our ability to cope. PST is valuable in diverse clinical settings, ranging from depression to schizophrenia, with research suggesting it as a highly effective treatment for teaching coping strategies and reducing emotional distress.

Many PST techniques are available to help improve clients’ positive outlook on obstacles while reducing avoidance of problem situations and the tendency to be careless and impulsive.

The PST model typically assesses the client’s strengths, weaknesses, and coping strategies when facing problems before encouraging a healthy experience of and relationship with problem-solving.

Why not use this article to explore the theory behind PST and try out some of our powerful tools and interventions with your clients to help them with their decision-making, coping, and problem-solving?

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our three Positive Psychology Exercises for free .

• Cuijpers, P., Wit, L., Kleiboer, A., Karyotaki, E., & Ebert, D. (2020). Problem-solving therapy for adult depression: An updated meta-analysis. European P sychiatry ,  48 (1), 27–37.
• Dobson, K. S. (2011). Handbook of cognitive-behavioral therapies (3rd ed.). Guilford Press.
• Dobson, K. S., & Dozois, D. J. A. (2021). Handbook of cognitive-behavioral therapies  (4th ed.). Guilford Press.
• Eysenck, M. W., & Keane, M. T. (2015). Cognitive psychology: A student’s handbook . Psychology Press.
• Nezu, A. M., & Nezu, C. M. (2009). Problem-solving therapy DVD . Retrieved September 13, 2021, from https://www.apa.org/pubs/videos/4310852
• Nezu, A. M., & Nezu, C. M. (2018). Emotion-centered problem-solving therapy: Treatment guidelines. Springer.
• Nezu, A. M., Nezu, C. M., & D’Zurilla, T. J. (2013). Problem-solving therapy: A treatment manual . Springer.

Share this article:

Article feedback

What our readers think.

Thanks for your information given, it was helpful for me something new I learned

Let us know your thoughts Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published.

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Related articles

The Empty Chair Technique: How It Can Help Your Clients

Resolving ‘unfinished business’ is often an essential part of counseling. If left unresolved, it can contribute to depression, anxiety, and mental ill-health while damaging existing [...]

29 Best Group Therapy Activities for Supporting Adults

As humans, we are social creatures with personal histories based on the various groups that make up our lives. Childhood begins with a family of [...]

47 Free Therapy Resources to Help Kick-Start Your New Practice

Setting up a private practice in psychotherapy brings several challenges, including a considerable investment of time and money. You can reduce risks early on by [...]

Read other articles by their category

• Body & Brain (49)
• Coaching & Application (58)
• Compassion (25)
• Counseling (51)
• Emotional Intelligence (23)
• Gratitude (18)
• Grief & Bereavement (21)
• Happiness & SWB (40)
• Meaning & Values (26)
• Meditation (20)
• Mindfulness (44)
• Motivation & Goals (45)
• Optimism & Mindset (34)
• Positive CBT (30)
• Positive Communication (21)
• Positive Education (47)
• Positive Emotions (32)
• Positive Leadership (19)
• Positive Parenting (15)
• Positive Psychology (34)
• Positive Workplace (37)
• Productivity (17)
• Relationships (43)
• Resilience & Coping (38)
• Self Awareness (21)
• Self Esteem (38)
• Strengths & Virtues (32)
• Stress & Burnout Prevention (34)
• Theory & Books (46)
• Therapy Exercises (37)
• Types of Therapy (64)

Problem Solving and Emotion Coping Styles for Social Anxiety: A Meta-analysis of Chinese Mainland Students

• Original Article
• Published: 28 June 2023

Cite this article

• Zehua Dong 1 ,
• Ming Ming Chiu 2 ,
• Shuqi Zhou 3 &
• Zihong Zhang 4  

384 Accesses

2 Citations

Explore all metrics

Studies of how positive and negative coping styles affect social anxiety show mixed results. Hence, our two meta-analyses determined the overall effect sizes of problem solving-focused coping (PSC) styles and emotion-focused coping (EFC) styles on social anxiety in mainland China (PSC: k  = 49 studies, N  = 34,669; EFC: k  = 52, N  = 36,531). PSC was negatively linked to social anxiety (− .198), and EFC was positively linked to social anxiety (.223). In years with more national income, PSC’s and EFC’s effect sizes were larger. PSC’s effect sizes were smaller among rural students (vs. urban students), larger among older students (university, high school, middle school), and larger in cross-sectional (vs. longitudinal) studies. When using SAD (vs. others) social anxiety measures, PSC effect sizes were larger, but EFC effect sizes were smaller. EFC effect sizes were larger in studies with convenience (vs. representative) samples. Gender, single child status, and coping style measurement showed no moderation effects. These findings suggest that using problem solving-focused coping styles rather than emotion-focused may reduce social anxiety, so future experimental studies can test this idea more rigorously.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA) Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Rent this article via DeepDyve

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Understanding social anxiety disorder in adolescents and improving treatment outcomes: applying the cognitive model of clark and wells (1995).

Regulating Emotionality to Manage Adversity: A Systematic Review of the Relation Between Emotion Regulation and Psychological Resilience

Social Anxiety Disorder

Data availability.

The data of this research used is presented in Table 1 in the manuscript. Inquiries about the specific data used in this study can be directed to the corresponding author.

*Primary studies included in the meta-analysis

American Psychiatric Association (2000) Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders—text revision (DSM-IV-TR). American Psychiatric Association, Washington, DC

Book   Google Scholar  

Gilbert P (2000) The relationship of shame, social anxiety and depression: the role of the evaluation of social rank. Clin Psychol Psychother 7:174–189. https://doi.org/10.1002/1099-0879(200007)7:3%3c174::AID-CPP236%3e3.0.CO;2-U

Article   Google Scholar  

Caplan SE (2007) Relations among loneliness, social anxiety and problematic internet use. Cyberpsychol Behav 10:234–242. https://doi.org/10.1089/cpb.2006.9963

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Schry AR, White SW (2013) Understanding the relationship between social anxiety and alcohol use in college students: a meta-analysis. Addict Behav 38:2690–2706. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2013.06.014

Morrison AS, Heimberg RG (2013) Social anxiety and social anxiety disorder. Annu Rev Clin Psychol 9:249–274. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-050212-185631

Guo X, Meng Z, Huang G, Fan J, Zhou W, Ling W, Jiang J, Long J, Su L (2016) Meta-analysis of the prevalence of anxiety disorders in mainland China from 2000 to 2015. Sci Rep 6:28033

Article   PubMed   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

Xiao R, Wu W, Hu J, Qiu C, Wang Q, Wei G, Sun J, Yang C, Song P, Ye A, Zhang W (2006) Prevalence and risk factors of social anxiety disorder in high schools and universities in Chengdu. J Sichuan Univ (Med Sci Edn) 37(4):636–640

Google Scholar  

Ranta K, Kaltiala-Heino R, Rantanen P, Marttunen M (2009) Social phobia in Finnish general adolescent population: Prevalence, comorbidity, individual and family correlates, and service use. Depress Anxiety 26:528–536. https://doi.org/10.1002/da.20422

Lazarus RS, Folkman S (1984) Stress, appraisal, and coping. Springer, New York

Compas BE, Connor-Smith JK, Saltzman H, Thomsen AH, Wadsworth M (2001) Coping with stress during childhood and adolescence: problems, progress, and potential in theory and research. Psychol Bull 127:87–127. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.127.1.87

Blumenthal H, Ham LS, Cloutier RM, Bacon AK, Douglas ME (2016) Social anxiety, disengagement coping, and alcohol-use behaviors among adolescents. Anxiety Stress Coping 29(4):432–446. https://doi.org/10.1080/10615806.2015.1058366

*Liao C, Liu Q, Zhang J (2014) The correlation between social anxiety and loneliness of left-behind children in rural China: effect of coping style. Health 6:1714–1723. https://doi.org/10.4236/health.2014.614204

*Yang T, Liu J, Zhang Y, Zhang Q, Shangguan L, Li Z, Luo X, Gong J (2021) Coping style predicts sense of security and mediates the relationship between autistic traits and social anxiety: moderation by a polymorphism of the FKBP5 gene. Behav Brain Res 404:113142. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbr.2021.113142

*Liu X (2014) The correlation study of social anxiety, coping style and mobile phone dependence among the youth [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

Wright M, Banerjee R, Hoek W (2010) Depression and social anxiety in children: differential links with coping strategies. J Abnorm Child Psychol 38:405–419. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-009-9375-4

*Cao J, Cai Y (2010) Status and influencing factors of Internet addiction among junior high school students in Daqing city. Chin J Health 31(12):1461–1462

*Wan L (2007). The research for the middle school student’s features of social anxiety and coping strategy and the relationship between them [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Ba Y (2009) A study on contributing factors of social anxiety in medical college students [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Gao X (2015) Comparison of mental and behavior characteristic between adolescents of Uighur and Han in Karamay of Xinjiang. Chin J Health Psychol 23(9):1354–1356

Hsu W-Y, Chen M-C, Wang T-H, Sun S-H (2008) Coping strategies in Chinese social context. Asian J Soc Psychol 11:150–162. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-839X.2008.00252.x

Fan Q, Chang WC (2015) Social anxiety among Chinese people. Sci World J 2015:743147. https://doi.org/10.1155/2015/743147

Heine SJ (2005) Constructing good selves in Japan and North America. In: Sorrentino R, Cohen D, Olson J, Zanna M (eds) Culture and social behavior. Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ, pp 95–116

Lee YY, Kam C, Bond MH (2007) Predicting emotional reactions after being harmed by another. Asian J Soc Psychol 10:85–92

*Li D (2020) Influence of the youth’s psychological capital on social anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak: the mediating role of coping style. Iran J Public Health 49(11):2060–2068. https://doi.org/10.18502/ijph.v49i11.4721

Ireland JL, Boustead R, Ireland CA (2005) Coping style and psychological health among adolescent prisoners: a study of young and juvenile offenders. J Adolesc 28:411–423. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2004.11.002

Hershcovis MS, Cameron AF, Gervais L, Bozeman J (2018) The effects of confrontation and avoidance coping in response to workplace incivility. J Occup Health Psychol 23(2):163. https://doi.org/10.1037/ocp0000078

Kaeppler AK, Erath SA (2017) Linking social anxiety with social competence in early adolescence: physiological and coping moderators. J Abnorm Child Psychol 45:371–384. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-016-0173-5

Triandis HC (1989) The self and social behavior in differing cultural contexts. Psychol Rev 96(3):506–520. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295x.96.3.506

Markus HR, Kitayama S (1991) Culture and the self: implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation. Psychol Rev 98(2):224–253. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295x.98.2.224

Conversano C, Rotondo A, Lensi E, Della Vista O, Arpone F, Reda MA (2010) Optimism and its impact on mental and physical well-being. Clin Pract Epidemiol Ment Health 6:25–29. https://doi.org/10.2174/1745017901006010025

Ryan RM, Deci EL (2019) Brick by brick: the origins, development, and future of self-determination theory. In: Advances in motivation science, vol 6, pp 111–156. Elsevier, Amsterdam

Tamannaeifar M, Sanatkarfar M (2017) Social anxiety study based on coping strategies and attachment strategies. J Pract Clin Psychol 5(2):115–122. https://doi.org/10.18869/acadpub.jpcp.5.2.115

Sewasew D, Schroeders U (2019) The developmental interplay of academic self-concept and achievement within and across domains among primary school students. Contemp Educ Psychol 58:204–212. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2019.03.009

Rebello NS, Cui L, Bennett AG, Zollman DA, Ozimek DJ (2017) Transfer of learning in problem solving in the context of mathematics and physics. Learning to solve complex scientific problems. Routledge, London, pp 223–246

Chapter   Google Scholar  

Maier SF, Seligman ME (2016) Learned helplessness at fifty: Insights from neuroscience. Psychol Rev 123(4):349–367. https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000033

Moritz S, Jahns AK, Schröder J, Berger T, Lincoln TM, Klein JP et al (2016) More adaptive versus less maladaptive coping: What is more predictive of symptom severity? Development of a new scale to investigate coping profiles across different psychopathological syndromes. J Affect Disord 191:300–307. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2015.11.027

Uusberg A, Taxer JL, Yih J, Uusberg H, Gross JJ (2019) Reappraising reappraisal. Emot Rev 11(4):267–282. https://doi.org/10.1177/1754073919862617

Wells A (2009) Metacognitive Therapy for Anxiety and Depression. Guilford Press, New York

Nordahl H, Hjemdal O, Hagen R, Nordahl HM, Wells A (2019) What lies beneath trait-anxiety? Testing the self-regulatory executive function model of vulnerability. Front Psychol 10:122. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00122

Kocovski N, Endler NS (2000) Self-regulation: social anxiety and depression. J Appl Biobehav Res 5(1):80–91. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9861.2000.tb00065.x

The World Bank (2023) China. https://data.worldbank.org/country/CN

Patel V, Burns JK, Dhingra M, Tarver L, Kohrt BA, Lund C (2018) Income inequality and depression: a systematic review and meta-analysis of the association and a scoping review of mechanisms. World Psychiatry 17(1):76–89

Fan VS, Mahadevan R, Leung J (2021) Effect of income inequality, community infrastructure and individual stressors on adult depression. Health Promot Int 36(1):46–57

Lupien SJ, Maheu F, Tu M, Fiocco A, Schramek TE (2007) The effects of stress and stress hormones on human cognition: Implications for the field of brain and cognition. Brain Cogn 65(3):209–237

Chiu MM (2018) Learning strategies. In: Levesque’s RJR (ed) Encyclopedia of adolescence, 2nd edn. Springer, New York

Lesaux NK, Rupp AA, Siegel LS (2007) Growth in reading skills of children from diverse linguistic backgrounds: findings from a 5-year longitudinal study. J Educ Psychol 99(4):821. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.99.4.821

Christov-Moore L, Simpson EA, Coudé G, Grigaityte K, Iacoboni M, Ferrari PF (2014) Empathy: gender effects in brain and behavior. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 46:604–627

Van der Graaff J, Carlo G, Crocetti E, Koot HM, Branje S (2018) Prosocial behavior in adolescence: gender differences in development and links with empathy. J Youth Adolesc 47(5):1086–1099

Wood-Downie H, Wong B, Kovshoff H, Cortese S, Hadwin JA (2021) Research review: a systematic review and meta-analysis of sex/gender differences in social interaction and communication in autistic and nonautistic children and adolescents. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 62(8):922–936. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcpp.13337

Asher M, Asnaani A, Aderka IM (2017) Gender differences in social anxiety disorder: a review. Clin Psychol Rev 56:1–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2017.05.004

Demir T, Karacetin G, Demir DE, Uysal O (2013) Prevalence and some psychosocial characteristics of social anxiety disorder in an urban population of Turkish children and adolescents. Eur Psychiatry 28(1):64–69. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eurpsy.2011.12.003

Xu Y, Schneier F, Heimberg RG, Princisvalle K, Liebowitz MR, Wang S, Blanco C (2012) Gender differences in social anxiety disorder: results from the national epidemiologic sample on alcohol and related conditions. J Anxiety Disord 26(1):12–19. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.janxdis.2011.08.006

Hofmann SG, Asnaani A, Hinton DE (2010) Cultural aspects in social anxiety and social anxiety disorder. Depress Anxiety 27:1117–1127. https://doi.org/10.1002/da.20759

Kelly M, Tyrka AR, Price LH, Carpenter LL (2008) Sex differences in the use of coping strategies: predictors of anxiety and depressive symptoms. Depress Anxiety 25(10):839–846. https://doi.org/10.1002/da.20341

Debbarma R, Umadevi G (2019) Social anxiety and coping strategies among college students. Indian J Health Well-Being 10(7–9):221–223

Xiao J, Xu X (1996) A study on the validity and reliability of the Coping Style Questionnaire. Chin Ment Health J 10(4):164–168

Xie Y (1998) A preliminary study on the reliability and validity of the Simplified Coping Style Scale. Chin J Clin Psychol 6(2):114–115. https://doi.org/10.16128/j.cnki.1005-3611.1998.02.018

Watson D, Friend R (1969) Measurement of social-evaluative anxiety. J Consult Clin Psychol 33:448–457. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0027806

La Greca AM, Dandes SK, Wick P, Shaw K, Stone WL (1988) Development of the social anxiety scale for children: reliability and concurrent validity. J Clin Child Psychol 17(1):84–91. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15374424jccp1701_11

La Greca AM, Lopez N (1998) Social anxiety among adolescents: linkages with peer relations and friendships. J Abnorm Child Psychol 26(2):83–94. https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1022684520514

Leary MR, Kowalski RM (1993) The Interaction Anxiousness Scale: Construct and criterion-related validity. J Pers Assess 61(1):136–146. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327752jpa6101_10

Segawa E, Schalet B, Cella D (2020) A comparison of computer adaptive tests (CATs) and short forms in terms of accuracy and number of items administrated using PROMIS profile. Qual Life Res 29(1):213–221

Loken E, Gelman A (2017) Measurement error and the replication crisis. Science 355:584–585

Liberati A, Altman DG, Tetzlaff J, Mulrow C, Gøtzsche PC, Ioannidis JPA, Clarke M, Devereaux PJ, Kleijnen J, Moher D (2009) The PRISMA statement for reporting systematic reviews and meta-analyses of studies that evaluate health care interventions: explanation and elaboration. J Clin Epidemiol 62(10):1–34. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.b2700

*Cai W, Xin H (2021) Survey on social anxiety and coping styles of medical undergraduates. J Shenyang Med Coll 23(1):78–81

*Cai Y, Cao J, Zhou Y, Wang X, Zhang H, Yang J (2011) The status and influencing factors of Internet addition among high school students in Daqing city. Mod Prev Med 38(13):2511–2513

*Cao Q (2010) A study on the relationship of adolescents’ attachment, coping-style and social-anxiety [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Cao Z (2018) A study on the relationship between social anxiety and stress coping style among junior high school students. J Acad 17:57–58

*Cao H, Cao P, Wang P (2009) A correlation study on coping styles and social anxiety in college students. J UESTC (Soc Sci Edn) 11(3):91–94

*Cao J, Zhou Y, Wang X, Zhang H, Yang J (2010) Dominance analysis on predictive factors of Internet addiction among undergraduates in Daqing city. Chin Gen Pract 13(8A):2482–2484

*Chen Z (2013) A study on the relationship among Internet addiction in college students with social anxiety, coping style [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Chen Q (2013) Analysis of social anxiety and related factors in higher vocational nursing students [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Chen Q (2014) Analysis of social anxiety and related factors in higher vocational nursing freshmen students. Health Vocat Educ 32(11):110–111

*Du C, Wu Y (2015) The relationship between personality traits and social anxiety in primary school students: the mediating role of coping style. Spirit Lead 17:143–144

*Gu M (2012) Study of adolescents’ Internet use and Internet addiction in Shanghai, China: implications for social work practice (Unpublished Doctoral dissertation). The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

*Guo M (2019) The effect of school bullying on the mental health of junior high school students: The multiple mediating roles of optimism, self-esteem and coping style [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Hong D (2012) A survey of social anxiety and coping style of independent college students and group intervention [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Hu F, Sang Q (2010) Research on the characteristics and relationship among general self-efficacy, treatments and social anxiety of migrant children. J Anhui Univ Sci Technol (Soc Sci) 12(3):77–80

*Hu Y (2015) Study on the relationship among higher vocational college students’ social anxiety, coping styles and subjective well-being [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Hu Y (2017) Research of the relationship among coping style, psychological security and social anxiety of college students with left-behind experience [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Li G, Cao J, Wang B (2012) Advantageous analysis of predictors of social anxiety among nursing students. China High Med Educ 8:42–44

*Liang R, Zheng L (2015) Research on the relationship between social anxiety, self-concept and coping style among the junior school students. Chin J Gen Pract 13(3):441–442

*Liang Z, Lu L, Ji J, Zhu S, Yu J (2004) A study on contributing factors to social avoidance and distress in college students. Chin J Health 25(3):318–320

*Lin X, Fang X, Liu Y, Lan J (2009) The effect mechanism of stigma perception on mental health among migrant children in Beijing. Acta Psychol Sin 41(10):967–979

*Lin Z, Xie L, Zhao Y, Su W, Hu S, Chen L, Yang C (2020) Influence of freshmen’s self-efficacy of emotion regulation on social anxiety: mediating effect of coping styles. Health Res 40(3):285–287

*Liu F, Wang N, Chen L (2021) Neuroticism and positive coping style as mediators of the association between childhood psychological maltreatment and social anxiety. Curr Psychol. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-021-02360-9

*Liu Z, Jiang X, Fang X, Xu Z (2017) The effect of interpersonal trust and coping style on social avoidance of college students. Chin J Health Psychol 25(11):1699–1704

*Ma W, Li Y, Liu Y, Li H (2011) A study on the relationship between social anxiety and coping style among secondary school students. J Southwest Agric Univ (Soc Sci Edn) 9(12):200–203

*Peng Q (2012) A study on relationships between reinforcement sensitivity, coping style and social anxiety among college students [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Qin H, Lu L (2009) A study on the correlation between social anxiety and coping styles among college students. Shanxi Med J 38(1):13–14

*Rao F (2021) Research on the relationship between social anxiety and coping style of senior high school students and intervention [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Shi Y (2015) The development, adaptive function and mechanism of social anxiety in middle childhood [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Sun, Z. (2011). The study of pupils’ social anxiety and coping style [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Wan G, Cao J, Sun C, Meng X (2011) Factors of social anxiety among nursing students. China High Med Educ 11:11–12

*Wang L (2004) The study on college and middle school students’ pathological Internet use and its influencing factors [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database.

*Wang N (2019) The influence of cyber-victimization on social anxiety: a study on the mechanism and intervention of coping style among senior high school [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database.

*Wang S (2021) Study on the status of social avoidance and distress and its influencing factors among the medical undergraduates [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Wang C, Jin X, Song Y (2013) Research on the relationship between social anxiety, coping style and self-esteem of college students. China Health Vis 21(4):46

*Wang J, Ji Z, Shi X, Wang F (2015) Study on the relationship among social anxiety, social support and coping styles of higher nursing students. Nurs Pract Res 12(4):1–3

*Wang S, Geng Y, Li Y, Zhang W, Xie Q, Sun W (2021) Analysis of social avoidance and distress levels of preventive medicine students and their influencing factors. Chin J Health Stat 38(2):238–240

*Wu L, Jing Y (2013) Research on the relationship between social anxiety and coping styles of nursing students in vocational secondary schools. Health Vocat Educ 31(22):128–129

*Wu Y (2015) Change and associated factors of social anxiety symptoms among children in One Rural Area of Anhui Province: a 2-year fellow-up study [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database.

*Xiao W (2018) The relationship between psychological capital and social anxiety: the mediating role of uncertainty intolerance and coping style [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database.

*Yuan X, Fang X, Liu Y, Lin X (2012) The Relationship between stress coping, depression and social anxiety among migrant children: a longitudinal study. Psychol Dev Educ 3:283–291

*Zhang W (2008) A study for the relationship between social anxiety with self-concept and coping style to college students [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database

*Zhang T (2021) The influence of negative life events on college students’ social anxiety——Mediated by perceived social support and coping style [Master’s thesis]. China master’s theses full-text database.

*Zheng M (2020) Related research on social Anxiety, coping style and social support of higher vocational nursing students. Vocat Technol 19(6):31–34

*Zou Y, Yin D (2011) A structural equation model analysis of predictive factors of internet addiction in college students. China High Med Educ 11:41–42

The World Bank (2022) World development indicators. https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?dsid=2&series=NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.KD

McHugh ML (2012) Interrater reliability: the kappa statistic. Biochem Med 22:276–282. https://doi.org/10.11613/BM.2012.031

Zhang Y, Li S, Yu G (2019) The relationship between self-esteem and social anxiety: a meta-analysis with Chinese students. Adv Psychol Sci 27(6):1005–1018. https://doi.org/10.3724/SP.J.1042.2019.01005

Borenstein M, Hedges LV, Higgins JPT, Rothstein HR (2009) Introduction to meta-analysis. Wiley, New York

Borenstein M, Hedges L, Higgins J, Rothstein H (2014) Comprehensive meta-analysis: a computer program from research synthesis (Version 3). Biostat

Higgins JPT, Thompson SG, Deeks JJ, Altman DG (2003) Measuring inconsistency in meta-analyses. BMJ 327:557–560. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.327.7414.557

Huedo-Medina TB, Sánchez-Meca F, Marín-Martínez F, Botella J (2006) Assessing heterogeneity in meta-analysis: I 2 or Q statistic? Psychol Methods 11:193–206. https://doi.org/10.1037/1082-989X.11.2.193

Egger M, Smith GD, Schneider M, Minder C (1997) Bias in meta-analysis detected by a simple graphical test. BMJ 315:629–634. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.315.7109.629

Rosenthal R (1993) Meta-analytic procedures for social research. Sage, Newbury Park

Khaled EA (2021) Effectiveness of coping strategies program in reducing the rejection sensitivity and social anxiety with college students. Univ J Educ Res 9(5):901–910. https://doi.org/10.13189/ujer.2021.090502

Baker JP, Berenbaum H (2011) Dyadic moderators of the effectiveness of problem-focused and emotional-approach coping interventions. Cogn Ther Res 35(6):550–559

Greenberg LS (2002) Emotion-focused therapy: coaching clients to work through their feelings. American Psychological Association, Washington, DC

Cinelli C, Hazlett C (2020) Making sense of sensitivity: extending omitted variable bias. J R Stat Soc Ser B 82(1):39–67

Download references

This study was supported by the Zhejiang Research Institute of Education Science (GH2023268).

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Jing Hengyi School of Education; Chinese Education Modernization Research Institute of Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China

Special Education and Counseling, Analytics\Assessment Research Centre, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

Ming Ming Chiu

College of Foreign Languages, Donghua University, Shanghai, China

Institute of Curriculum and Instruction, East China Normal University, Shanghai, China

Zihong Zhang

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Contributions

ZD wrote the introduction, literature review, did the analysis, wrote up method, results, and discussion parts. MMC gave feedbacks and revised the paper. SZ gave feedbacks and finalized the paper. ZZ participated in the coding process. All authors contributed to the article and approved the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shuqi Zhou .

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest.

The authors declare that we have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

It is not applicable to this study.

Consent Statement

Additional information, publisher's note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Dong, Z., Chiu, M.M., Zhou, S. et al. Problem Solving and Emotion Coping Styles for Social Anxiety: A Meta-analysis of Chinese Mainland Students. Child Psychiatry Hum Dev (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-023-01561-6

Download citation

Accepted : 13 June 2023

Published : 28 June 2023

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-023-01561-6

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Social anxiety
• Problem solving coping style
• Emotion coping style
• Meta-analysis
• Mainland China
• Find a journal
• Publish with us
• Track your research

The 2 types of coping skills every worker needs to combat burnout in 2024

B earing the weight of what the world (and workplace) throws at us can feel like a second full-time job. Coping mechanisms , or strategies for managing stress and other prickly emotions , help us fight burnout and regain power in our daily lives. And according to Minaa B .—social worker, author, and mental health educator—every modern-day worker needs two types of coping mechanisms in their stress-beating toolkits.

Whether you know it or not, you’re probably already putting coping strategies to work each day. Perhaps you go for a brisk walk when your to-do list feels overwhelming or practice mindfulness after a stressful conversation with your manager. But Minaa says that being aware of why and how you’re coping can help us take the best care of ourselves when overwhelm—and even burnout—strikes. 

“There are two coping methods that are essential for the quality of our mental health, which is problem-solving coping as well as emotion-focused coping,” she says. 

Problem-solving coping vs. emotion-focused coping 

When you’re deciding what type of coping strategy to choose, the first question you should ask yourself is: Is the stressor within or beyond my control? “Problem-solving coping is when we recognize that there is a problem, and we engage in self-efficacy to find a solution to that problem,” says Minaa. In other words, problem-solving coping is necessary when you have the power to change—or at least mitigate—the issue. 

For example, if you realize that hours of meetings each day are resulting in feelings of burnout, you may block off your calendar on Tuesdays and Thursdays so that no one can reach you. Alternatively, if you find that social interaction increases your bandwidth for stressful situations, problem-solving coping could look like taking more opportunities to connect with your co-workers. 

Emotion-focused coping comes into play when the stressor is beyond your control. Maybe your boss has given you an impossible deadline or delegated something to you that’s not part of your job description. “Emotion focus coping happens when we recognize there is a barrier, obstacle, or adversity before us that we really can't change,” says Minaa. “Radical acceptance allows us to engage in emotion-focused coping where we ask ourselves, How does this obstacle, this thing in front of me, make me feel? ” 

Once you answer this question, you can engage in self-soothing techniques that help you carry the weight of this task. “Maybe I need to engage in breathwork. Maybe I need to meditate. Maybe I need to write my thoughts down in a journal. Maybe this is the topic I want to talk about in my next therapy session ,” says Minaa. Your self-soothing technique will be entirely unique, so spend some time thinking about what makes you feel better in tense, nerve-wracking moments. 

Co-regulation, or relying on someone else to ease a stressful moment, also falls under the emotion-focused coping category. Minaa says that spilling your frustrations to a family member or a friend can be a powerful tool for diffusing stress during or after a seemingly impossible task is complete. 

So that text that reads, “Can you talk for a second? Need to vent!” is not trivial; it’s a powerful coping tool.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

• SUGGESTED TOPICS
• The Magazine
• Newsletters
• Managing Yourself
• Managing Teams
• Work-life Balance
• The Big Idea
• Data & Visuals
• Reading Lists
• Case Selections
• HBR Learning
• Topic Feeds
• Account Settings
• Email Preferences

Share Podcast

A Better Framework for Solving Tough Problems

Start with trust and end with speed.

• Apple Podcasts

When it comes to solving complicated problems, the default for many organizational leaders is to take their time to work through the issues at hand. Unfortunately, that often leads to patchwork solutions or problems not truly getting resolved.

But Anne Morriss offers a different framework. In this episode, she outlines a five-step process for solving any problem and explains why starting with trust and ending with speed is so important for effective change leadership. As she says, “Let’s get into dialogue with the people who are also impacted by the problem before we start running down the path of solving it.”

Morriss is an entrepreneur and leadership coach. She’s also the coauthor of the book, Move Fast and Fix Things: The Trusted Leader’s Guide to Solving Hard Problems .

Key episode topics include: strategy, decision making and problem solving, strategy execution, managing people, collaboration and teams, trustworthiness, organizational culture, change leadership, problem solving, leadership.

HBR On Strategy curates the best case studies and conversations with the world’s top business and management experts, to help you unlock new ways of doing business. New episodes every week.

• Listen to the full HBR IdeaCast episode: How to Solve Tough Problems Better and Faster (2023)
• Find more episodes of HBR IdeaCast
• Discover 100 years of Harvard Business Review articles, case studies, podcasts, and more at HBR.org .

HANNAH BATES: Welcome to HBR On Strategy , case studies and conversations with the world’s top business and management experts, hand-selected to help you unlock new ways of doing business.

When it comes to solving complicated problems, many leaders only focus on the most apparent issues. Unfortunately that often leads to patchwork or partial solutions. But Anne Morriss offers a different framework that aims to truly tackle big problems by first leaning into trust and then focusing on speed.

Morriss is an entrepreneur and leadership coach. She’s also the co-author of the book, Move Fast and Fix Things: The Trusted Leader’s Guide to Solving Hard Problems . In this episode, she outlines a five-step process for solving any problem. Some, she says, can be solved in a week, while others take much longer. She also explains why starting with trust and ending with speed is so important for effective change leadership.

This episode originally aired on HBR IdeaCast in October 2023. Here it is.

CURT NICKISCH: Welcome to the HBR IdeaCast from Harvard Business Review. I’m Curt Nickisch.

Problems can be intimidating. Sure, some problems are fun to dig into. You roll up your sleeves, you just take care of them; but others, well, they’re complicated. Sometimes it’s hard to wrap your brain around a problem, much less fix it.

And that’s especially true for leaders in organizations where problems are often layered and complex. They sometimes demand technical, financial, or interpersonal knowledge to fix. And whether it’s avoidance on the leaders’ part or just the perception that a problem is systemic or even intractable, problems find a way to endure, to keep going, to keep being a problem that everyone tries to work around or just puts up with.

But today’s guest says that just compounds it and makes the problem harder to fix. Instead, she says, speed and momentum are key to overcoming a problem.

Anne Morriss is an entrepreneur, leadership coach and founder of the Leadership Consortium and with Harvard Business School Professor Francis Frei, she wrote the new book, Move Fast and Fix Things: The Trusted Leaders Guide to Solving Hard Problems . Anne, welcome back to the show.

ANNE MORRISS: Curt, thank you so much for having me.

CURT NICKISCH: So, to generate momentum at an organization, you say that you really need speed and trust. We’ll get into those essential ingredients some more, but why are those two essential?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah. Well, the essential pattern that we observed was that the most effective change leaders out there were building trust and speed, and it didn’t seem to be a well-known observation. We all know the phrase, “Move fast and break things,” but the people who were really getting it right were moving fast and fixing things, and that was really our jumping off point. So when we dug into the pattern, what we observed was they were building trust first and then speed. This foundation of trust was what allowed them to fix more things and break fewer.

CURT NICKISCH: Trust sounds like a slow thing, right? If you talk about building trust, that is something that takes interactions, it takes communication, it takes experiences. Does that run counter to the speed idea?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah. Well, this issue of trust is something we’ve been looking at for over a decade. One of the headlines in our research is it’s actually something we’re building and rebuilding and breaking all the time. And so instead of being this precious, almost farbege egg, it’s this thing that is constantly in motion and this thing that we can really impact when we’re deliberate about our choices and have some self-awareness around where it’s breaking down and how it’s breaking down.

CURT NICKISCH: You said break trust in there, which is intriguing, right? That you may have to break trust to build trust. Can you explain that a little?

ANNE MORRISS:  Yeah, well, I’ll clarify. It’s not that you have to break it in order to build it. It’s just that we all do it some of the time. Most of us are trusted most of the time. Most of your listeners I imagine are trusted most of the time, but all of us have a pattern where we break trust or where we don’t build as much as could be possible.

CURT NICKISCH: I want to talk about speed, this other essential ingredient that’s so intriguing, right? Because you think about solving hard problems as something that just takes a lot of time and thinking and coordination and planning and designing. Explain what you mean by it? And also, just  how we maybe approach problems wrong by taking them on too slowly?

ANNE MORRISS: Well, Curt, no one has ever said to us, “I wish I had taken longer and done less.” We hear the opposite all the time, by the way. So what we really set out to do was to create a playbook that anyone can use to take less time to do more of the things that are going to make your teams and organizations stronger.

And the way we set up the book is okay, it’s really a five step process. Speed is the last step. It’s the payoff for the hard work you’re going to do to figure out your problem, build or rebuild trust, expand the team in thoughtful and strategic ways, and then tell a real and compelling story about the change you’re leading.

Only then do you get to go fast, but that’s an essential part of the process, and we find that either people under emphasize it or speed has gotten a bad name in this world of moving fast and breaking things. And part of our mission for sure was to rehabilitate speed’s reputation because it is an essential part of the change leader’s equation. It can be the difference between good intentions and getting anything done at all.

CURT NICKISCH: You know, the fact that nobody ever tells you, “I wish we had done less and taken more time.” I think we all feel that, right? Sometimes we do something and then realize, “Oh, that wasn’t that hard and why did it take me so long to do it? And I wish I’d done this a long time ago.” Is it ever possible to solve a problem too quickly?

ANNE MORRISS: Absolutely. And we see that all the time too. What we push people to do in those scenarios is really take a look at the underlying issue because in most cases, the solution is not to take your foot off the accelerator per se and slow down. The solution is to get into the underlying problem. So if it’s burnout or a strategic disconnect between what you’re building and the marketplace you’re serving, what we find is the anxiety that people attach to speed or the frustration people attach to speed is often misplaced.

CURT NICKISCH: What is a good timeline to think about solving a problem then? Because if we by default take too long or else jump ahead and we don’t fix it right, what’s a good target time to have in your mind for how long solving a problem should take?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah. Well, we’re playful in the book and talking about the idea that many problems can be solved in a week. We set the book up five chapters. They’re titled Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and we’re definitely having fun with that. And yet, if you count the hours in a week, there are a lot of them. Many of our problems, if you were to spend a focused 40 hours of effort on a problem, you’re going to get pretty far.

But our main message is, listen, of course it’s going to depend on the nature of the problem, and you’re going to take weeks and maybe even some cases months to get to the other side. What we don’t want you to do is take years, which tends to be our default timeline for solving hard problems.

CURT NICKISCH: So you say to start with identifying the problem that’s holding you back, seems kind of obvious. But where do companies go right and wrong with this first step of just identifying the problem that’s holding you back?

ANNE MORRISS: And our goal is that all of these are going to feel obvious in retrospect. The problem is we skip over a lot of these steps and this is why we wanted to underline them. So this one is really rooted in our observation and I think the pattern of our species that we tend to be overconfident in the quality of our thoughts, particularly when it comes to diagnosing problems.

And so we want to invite you to start in a very humble and curious place, which tends not to be our default mode when we’re showing up for work. We convince ourselves that we’re being paid for our judgment. That’s exactly what gets reinforced everywhere. And so we tend to counterintuitively, given what we just talked about, we tend to move too quickly through the diagnostic phase.

CURT NICKISCH: “I know what to do, that’s why you hired me.”

ANNE MORRISS: Exactly. “I know what to do. That’s why you hired me. I’ve seen this before. I have a plan. Follow me.” We get rewarded for the expression of confidence and clarity. And so what we’re inviting people to do here is actually pause and really lean into what are the root causes of the problem you’re seeing? What are some alternative explanations? Let’s get into dialogue with the people who are also impacted by the problem before we start running down the path of solving it.

CURT NICKISCH: So what do you recommend for this step, for getting to the root of the problem? What are questions you should ask? What’s the right thought process? What do you do on Monday of the week?

ANNE MORRISS: In our experience of doing this work, people tend to undervalue the power of conversation, particularly with other people in the organization. So we will often advocate putting together a team of problem solvers, make it a temporary team, really pull in people who have a particular perspective on the problem and create the space, make it as psychologically safe as you can for people to really, as Chris Argyris so beautifully articulated, discuss the undiscussable.

And so the conditions for that are going to look different in every organization depending on the problem, but if you can get a space where smart people who have direct experience of a problem are in a room and talking honestly with each other, you can make an extraordinary amount of progress, certainly in a day.

CURT NICKISCH: Yeah, that gets back to the trust piece.

ANNE MORRISS: Definitely.

CURT NICKISCH: How do you like to start that meeting, or how do you like to talk about it? I’m just curious what somebody on that team might hear in that meeting, just to get the sense that it’s psychologically safe, you can discuss the undiscussable and you’re also focusing on the identification part. What’s key to communicate there?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah. Well, we sometimes encourage people to do a little bit of data gathering before those conversations. So the power of a quick anonymous survey around whatever problem you’re solving, but also be really thoughtful about the questions you’re going to ask in the moment. So a little bit of preparation can go a long way and a little bit of thoughtfulness about the power dynamic. So who’s going to walk in there with license to speak and who’s going to hold back? So being thoughtful about the agenda, about the questions you’re asking about the room, about the facilitation, and then courage is a very infectious emotion.

So if you can early on create the conditions for people to show up bravely in that conversation, then the chance that you’re going to get good information and that you’re going to walk out of that room with new insight in the problem that you didn’t have when you walked in is extraordinarily high.

CURT NICKISCH: Now, in those discussions, you may have people who have different perspectives on what the problem really is. They also bear different costs of addressing the problem or solving it. You talked about the power dynamic, but there’s also an unfairness dynamic of who’s going to actually have to do the work to take care of it, and I wonder how you create a culture in that meeting where it’s the most productive?

ANNE MORRISS: For sure, the burden of work is not going to be equitably distributed around the room. But I would say, Curt, the dynamic that we see most often is that people are deeply relieved that hard problems are being addressed. So it really can create, and more often than not in our experience, it does create this beautiful flywheel of action, creativity, optimism. Often when problems haven’t been addressed, there is a fair amount of anxiety in the organization, frustration, stagnation. And so credible movement towards action and progress is often the best antidote. So even if the plan isn’t super clear yet, if it’s credible, given who’s in the room and their decision rights and mandate, if there’s real momentum coming out of that to make progress, then that tends to be deeply energizing to people.

CURT NICKISCH: I wonder if there’s an organization that you’ve worked with that you could talk about how this rolled out and how this took shape?

ANNE MORRISS: When we started working with Uber, that was wrestling with some very public issues of culture and trust with a range of stakeholders internally, the organization, also external, that work really started with a campaign of listening and really trying to understand where trust was breaking down from the perspective of these stakeholders?

So whether it was female employees or regulators or riders who had safety concerns getting into the car with a stranger. This work, it starts with an honest internal dialogue, but often the problem has threads that go external. And so bringing that same commitment to curiosity and humility and dialogue to anyone who’s impacted by the problem is the fastest way to surface what’s really going on.

CURT NICKISCH: There’s a step in this process that you lay out and that’s communicating powerfully as a leader. So we’ve heard about listening and trust building, but now you’re talking about powerful communication. How do you do this and why is it maybe this step in the process rather than the first thing you do or the last thing you do?

ANNE MORRISS: So in our process, again, it’s the days of the week. On Monday you figured out the problem. Tuesday you really got into the sandbox in figuring out what a good enough plan is for building trust. Wednesday, step three, you made it better. You created an even better plan, bringing in new perspectives. Thursday, this fourth step is the day we’re saying you got to go get buy-in. You got to bring other people along. And again, this is a step where we see people often underinvest in the power and payoff of really executing it well.

CURT NICKISCH: How does that go wrong?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah, people don’t know the why. Human behavior and the change in human behavior really depends on a strong why. It’s not just a selfish, “What’s in it for me?” Although that’s helpful, but where are we going? I may be invested in a status quo and I need to understand, okay, if you’re going to ask me to change, if you’re going to invite me into this uncomfortable place of doing things differently, why am I here? Help me understand it and articulate the way forward and language that not only I can understand, but also that’s going to be motivating to me.

CURT NICKISCH: And who on my team was part of this process and all that kind of stuff?

ANNE MORRISS: Oh, yeah. I may have some really important questions that may be in the way of my buy-in and commitment to this plan. So certainly creating a space where those questions can be addressed is essential. But what we found is that there is an architecture of a great change story, and it starts with honoring the past, honoring the starting place. Sometimes we’re so excited about the change and animated about the change that what has happened before or what is even happening in the present tense is low on our list of priorities.

Or we want to label it bad, because that’s the way we’ve thought about the change, but really pausing and honoring what came before you and all the reasonable decisions that led up to it, I think can be really helpful to getting people emotionally where you want them to be willing to be guided by you. Going back to Uber, when Dara Khosrowshahi came in.

CURT NICKISCH: This is the new CEO.

ANNE MORRISS: The new CEO.

CURT NICKISCH: Replaced Travis Kalanick, the founder and first CEO, yeah.

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah, and had his first all-hands meeting. One of his key messages, and this is a quote, was that he was going to retain the edge that had made Uber, “A force of nature.” And in that meeting, the crowd went wild because this is also a company that had been beaten up publicly for months and months and months, and it was a really powerful choice. And his predecessor, Travis was in the room, and he also honored Travis’ incredible work and investment in bringing the company to the place where it was.

And I would use words like grace to also describe those choices, but there’s also an incredible strategic value to naming the starting place for everybody in the room because in most cases, most people in that room played a role in getting to that starting place, and you’re acknowledging that.

CURT NICKISCH: You can call it grace. Somebody else might call it diplomatic or strategic. But yeah, I guess like it or not, it’s helpful to call out and honor the complexity of the way things have been done and also the change that’s happening.

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah, and the value. Sometimes honoring the past is also owning what didn’t work or what wasn’t working for stakeholders or segments of the employee team, and we see that around culture change. Sometimes you’ve got to acknowledge that it was not an equitable environment, but whatever the worker, everyone in that room is bringing that pass with them. So again, making it discussable and using it as the jumping off place is where we advise people to start.

Then you’ve earned the right to talk about the change mandate, which we suggest using clear and compelling language about the why. “This is what happened, this is where we are, this is the good and the bad of it, and here’s the case for change.”

And then the last part, which is to describe a rigorous and optimistic way forward. It’s a simple past, present, future arc, which will be familiar to human beings. We love stories as human beings. It’s among the most powerful currency we have to make sense of the world.

CURT NICKISCH: Yeah. Chronological is a pretty powerful order.

ANNE MORRISS: Right. But again, the change leaders we see really get it right, are investing an incredible amount of time into the storytelling part of their job. Ursula Burns, the Head of Xerox is famous for the months and years she spent on the road just telling the story of Xerox’s change, its pivot into services to everyone who would listen, and that was a huge part of her success.

CURT NICKISCH: So Friday or your fifth step, you end with empowering teams and removing roadblocks. That seems obvious, but it’s critical. Can you dig into that a little bit?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah. Friday is the fun day. Friday’s the release of energy into the system. Again, you’ve now earned the right to go fast. You have a plan, you’re pretty confident it’s going to work. You’ve told the story of change the organization, and now you get to sprint. So this is about really executing with urgency, and it’s about a lot of the tactics of speed is where we focus in the book. So the tactics of empowerment, making tough strategic trade-offs so that your priorities are clear and clearly communicated, creating mechanisms to fast-track progress. At Etsy, CEO Josh Silverman, he labeled these projects ambulances. It’s an unfortunate metaphor, but it’s super memorable. These are the products that get to speed out in front of the other ones because the stakes are high and the clock is sticking.

CURT NICKISCH: You pull over and let it go by.

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah, exactly. And so we have to agree as an organization on how to do something like that. And so we see lots of great examples both in young organizations and big complex biotech companies with lots of regulatory guardrails have still found ways to do this gracefully.

And I think we end with this idea of conflict debt, which is a term we really love. Leanne Davey, who’s a team scholar and researcher, and anyone in a tech company will recognize the idea of tech debt, which is this weight the organization drags around until they resolve it. Conflict debt is a beautiful metaphor because it is this weight that we drag around and slows us down until we decide to clean it up and fix it. The organizations that are really getting speed right have figured out either formally or informally, how to create an environment where conflict and disagreements can be gracefully resolved.

CURT NICKISCH: Well, let’s talk about this speed more, right? Because I think this is one of those places that maybe people go wrong or take too long, and then you lose the awareness of the problem, you lose that urgency. And then that also just makes it less effective, right? It’s not just about getting the problem solved as quickly as possible. It’s also just speed in some ways helps solve the problem.

ANNE MORRISS: Oh, yeah. It really is the difference between imagining the change you want to lead and really being able to bring it to life. Speed is the thing that unlocks your ability to lead change. It needs a foundation, and that’s what Monday through Thursday is all about, steps one through four, but the finish line is executing with urgency, and it’s that urgency that releases the system’s energy, that communicates your priorities, that creates the conditions for your team to make progress.

CURT NICKISCH: Moving fast is something that entrepreneurs and tech companies certainly understand, but there’s also this awareness that with big companies, the bigger the organization, the harder it is to turn the aircraft carrier around, right? Is speed relative when you get at those levels, or do you think this is something that any company should be able to apply equally?

ANNE MORRISS: We think this applies to any company. The culture really lives at the level of team. So we believe you can make a tremendous amount of progress even within your circle of control as a team leader. I want to bring some humility to this and careful of words like universal, but we do think there’s some universal truths here around the value of speed, and then some of the byproducts like keeping fantastic people. Your best people want to solve problems, they want to execute, they want to make progress and speed, and the ability to do that is going to be a variable in their own equation of whether they stay or they go somewhere else where they can have an impact.

CURT NICKISCH: Right. They want to accomplish something before they go or before they retire or finish something out. And if you’re able to just bring more things on the horizon and have it not feel like it’s going to be another two years to do something meaningful.

ANNE MORRISS: People – I mean, they want to make stuff happen and they want to be around the energy and the vitality of making things happen, which again, is also a super infectious phenomenon. One of the most important jobs of a leader, we believe, is to set the metabolic pace of their teams and organizations. And so what we really dig into on Friday is, well, what does that look like to speed something up? What are the tactics of that?

CURT NICKISCH: I wonder if that universal truth, that a body in motion stays in motion applies to organizations, right? If an organization in motion stays in motion, there is something to that.

ANNE MORRISS: Absolutely.

CURT NICKISCH: Do you have a favorite client story to share, just where you saw speed just become a bit of a flywheel or just a positive reinforcement loop for more positive change at the organization?

ANNE MORRISS: Yeah. We work with a fair number of organizations that are on fire. We do a fair amount of firefighting, but we also less dramatically do a lot of fire prevention. So we’re brought into organizations that are working well and want to get better, looking out on the horizon. That work is super gratifying, and there is always a component of, well, how do we speed this up?

What I love about that work is there’s often already a high foundation of trust, and so it’s, well, how do we maintain that foundation but move this flywheel, as you said, even faster? And it’s really energizing because often there’s a lot of pent-up energy that… There’s a lot of loyalty to the organization, but often it’s also frustration and pent-up energy. And so when that gets released, when good people get the opportunity to sprint for the first time in a little while, it’s incredibly energizing, not just for us, but for the whole organization.

CURT NICKISCH: Anne, this is great. I think finding a way to solve problems better but also faster is going to be really helpful. So thanks for coming on the show to talk about it.

ANNE MORRISS:  Oh, Curt, it was such a pleasure. This is my favorite conversation. I’m delighted to have it anytime.

HANNAH BATES: That was entrepreneur, leadership coach, and author Anne Morriss – in conversation with Curt Nickisch on HBR IdeaCast.

We’ll be back next Wednesday with another hand-picked conversation about business strategy from Harvard Business Review. If you found this episode helpful, share it with your friends and colleagues, and follow our show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. While you’re there, be sure to leave us a review.

When you’re ready for more podcasts, articles, case studies, books, and videos with the world’s top business and management experts, you’ll find it all at HBR.org.

This episode was produced by Mary Dooe, Anne Saini, and me, Hannah Bates. Ian Fox is our editor. Special thanks to Rob Eckhardt, Maureen Hoch, Erica Truxler, Ramsey Khabbaz, Nicole Smith, Anne Bartholomew, and you – our listener. See you next week.

• Subscribe On:

Latest in this series

This article is about strategy.

• Decision making and problem solving
• Strategy execution
• Leadership and managing people
• Collaboration and teams
• Trustworthiness
• Organizational culture

Partner Center

• Bipolar Disorder
• Therapy Center
• When To See a Therapist
• Types of Therapy
• Best Online Therapy
• Best Couples Therapy
• Best Family Therapy
• Managing Stress
• Sleep and Dreaming
• Understanding Emotions
• Self-Improvement
• Healthy Relationships
• Student Resources
• Personality Types
• Guided Meditations
• Verywell Mind Insights
• 2024 Verywell Mind 25
• Mental Health in the Classroom
• Editorial Process
• Meet Our Review Board
• Crisis Support

What Is Problem-Solving Therapy?

Arlin Cuncic, MA, is the author of The Anxiety Workbook and founder of the website About Social Anxiety. She has a Master's degree in clinical psychology.

Daniel B. Block, MD, is an award-winning, board-certified psychiatrist who operates a private practice in Pennsylvania.

Verywell / Madelyn Goodnight

Problem-Solving Therapy Techniques

How effective is problem-solving therapy, things to consider, how to get started.

Problem-solving therapy is a brief intervention that provides people with the tools they need to identify and solve problems that arise from big and small life stressors. It aims to improve your overall quality of life and reduce the negative impact of psychological and physical illness.

Problem-solving therapy can be used to treat depression , among other conditions. It can be administered by a doctor or mental health professional and may be combined with other treatment approaches.

At a Glance

Problem-solving therapy is a short-term treatment used to help people who are experiencing depression, stress, PTSD, self-harm, suicidal ideation, and other mental health problems develop the tools they need to deal with challenges. This approach teaches people to identify problems, generate solutions, and implement those solutions. Let's take a closer look at how problem-solving therapy can help people be more resilient and adaptive in the face of stress.

Problem-solving therapy is based on a model that takes into account the importance of real-life problem-solving. In other words, the key to managing the impact of stressful life events is to know how to address issues as they arise. Problem-solving therapy is very practical in its approach and is only concerned with the present, rather than delving into your past.

This form of therapy can take place one-on-one or in a group format and may be offered in person or online via telehealth . Sessions can be anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours long. 

Key Components

There are two major components that make up the problem-solving therapy framework:

• Applying a positive problem-solving orientation to your life
• Using problem-solving skills

A positive problem-solving orientation means viewing things in an optimistic light, embracing self-efficacy , and accepting the idea that problems are a normal part of life. Problem-solving skills are behaviors that you can rely on to help you navigate conflict, even during times of stress. This includes skills like:

• Knowing how to identify a problem
• Defining the problem in a helpful way
• Trying to understand the problem more deeply
• Setting goals related to the problem
• Generating alternative, creative solutions to the problem
• Choosing the best course of action
• Implementing the choice you have made
• Evaluating the outcome to determine next steps

Problem-solving therapy is all about training you to become adaptive in your life so that you will start to see problems as challenges to be solved instead of insurmountable obstacles. It also means that you will recognize the action that is required to engage in effective problem-solving techniques.

Planful Problem-Solving

One problem-solving technique, called planful problem-solving, involves following a series of steps to fix issues in a healthy, constructive way:

• Problem definition and formulation : This step involves identifying the real-life problem that needs to be solved and formulating it in a way that allows you to generate potential solutions.
• Generation of alternative solutions : This stage involves coming up with various potential solutions to the problem at hand. The goal in this step is to brainstorm options to creatively address the life stressor in ways that you may not have previously considered.
• Decision-making strategies : This stage involves discussing different strategies for making decisions as well as identifying obstacles that may get in the way of solving the problem at hand.
• Solution implementation and verification : This stage involves implementing a chosen solution and then verifying whether it was effective in addressing the problem.

Other Techniques

Other techniques your therapist may go over include:

• Problem-solving multitasking , which helps you learn to think clearly and solve problems effectively even during times of stress
• Stop, slow down, think, and act (SSTA) , which is meant to encourage you to become more emotionally mindful when faced with conflict
• Healthy thinking and imagery , which teaches you how to embrace more positive self-talk while problem-solving

What Problem-Solving Therapy Can Help With

Problem-solving therapy addresses life stress issues and focuses on helping you find solutions to concrete issues. This approach can be applied to problems associated with various psychological and physiological symptoms.

Mental Health Issues

Problem-solving therapy may help address mental health issues, like:

• Chronic stress due to accumulating minor issues
• Complications associated with traumatic brain injury (TBI)
• Emotional distress
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
• Problems associated with a chronic disease like cancer, heart disease, or diabetes
• Self-harm and feelings of hopelessness
• Substance use
• Suicidal ideation

Specific Life Challenges

This form of therapy is also helpful for dealing with specific life problems, such as:

• Death of a loved one
• Dissatisfaction at work
• Everyday life stressors
• Family problems
• Financial difficulties
• Relationship conflicts

Your doctor or mental healthcare professional will be able to advise whether problem-solving therapy could be helpful for your particular issue. In general, if you are struggling with specific, concrete problems that you are having trouble finding solutions for, problem-solving therapy could be helpful for you.

Benefits of Problem-Solving Therapy

The skills learned in problem-solving therapy can be helpful for managing all areas of your life. These can include:

• Being able to identify which stressors trigger your negative emotions (e.g., sadness, anger)
• Confidence that you can handle problems that you face
• Having a systematic approach on how to deal with life's problems
• Having a toolbox of strategies to solve the issues you face
• Increased confidence to find creative solutions
• Knowing how to identify which barriers will impede your progress
• Knowing how to manage emotions when they arise
• Reduced avoidance and increased action-taking
• The ability to accept life problems that can't be solved
• The ability to make effective decisions
• The development of patience (realizing that not all problems have a "quick fix")

Problem-solving therapy can help people feel more empowered to deal with the problems they face in their lives. Rather than feeling overwhelmed when stressors begin to take a toll, this therapy introduces new coping skills that can boost self-efficacy and resilience .

Other Types of Therapy

Other similar types of therapy include cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT) . While these therapies work to change thinking and behaviors, they work a bit differently. Both CBT and SFBT are less structured than problem-solving therapy and may focus on broader issues. CBT focuses on identifying and changing maladaptive thoughts, and SFBT works to help people look for solutions and build self-efficacy based on strengths.

This form of therapy was initially developed to help people combat stress through effective problem-solving, and it was later adapted to address clinical depression specifically. Today, much of the research on problem-solving therapy deals with its effectiveness in treating depression.

Problem-solving therapy has been shown to help depression in: 

• Older adults
• People coping with serious illnesses like cancer

Problem-solving therapy also appears to be effective as a brief treatment for depression, offering benefits in as little as six to eight sessions with a therapist or another healthcare professional. This may make it a good option for someone unable to commit to a lengthier treatment for depression.

Problem-solving therapy is not a good fit for everyone. It may not be effective at addressing issues that don't have clear solutions, like seeking meaning or purpose in life. Problem-solving therapy is also intended to treat specific problems, not general habits or thought patterns .

In general, it's also important to remember that problem-solving therapy is not a primary treatment for mental disorders. If you are living with the symptoms of a serious mental illness such as bipolar disorder or schizophrenia , you may need additional treatment with evidence-based approaches for your particular concern.

Problem-solving therapy is best aimed at someone who has a mental or physical issue that is being treated separately, but who also has life issues that go along with that problem that has yet to be addressed.

For example, it could help if you can't clean your house or pay your bills because of your depression, or if a cancer diagnosis is interfering with your quality of life.

Your doctor may be able to recommend therapists in your area who utilize this approach, or they may offer it themselves as part of their practice. You can also search for a problem-solving therapist with help from the American Psychological Association’s (APA) Society of Clinical Psychology .

If receiving problem-solving therapy from a doctor or mental healthcare professional is not an option for you, you could also consider implementing it as a self-help strategy using a workbook designed to help you learn problem-solving skills on your own.

During your first session, your therapist may spend some time explaining their process and approach. They may ask you to identify the problem you’re currently facing, and they’ll likely discuss your goals for therapy .

Keep In Mind

Problem-solving therapy may be a short-term intervention that's focused on solving a specific issue in your life. If you need further help with something more pervasive, it can also become a longer-term treatment option.

Get Help Now

We've tried, tested, and written unbiased reviews of the best online therapy programs including Talkspace, BetterHelp, and ReGain. Find out which option is the best for you.

Shang P, Cao X, You S, Feng X, Li N, Jia Y. Problem-solving therapy for major depressive disorders in older adults: an updated systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials .  Aging Clin Exp Res . 2021;33(6):1465-1475. doi:10.1007/s40520-020-01672-3

Cuijpers P, Wit L de, Kleiboer A, Karyotaki E, Ebert DD. Problem-solving therapy for adult depression: An updated meta-analysis . Eur Psychiatry . 2018;48(1):27-37. doi:10.1016/j.eurpsy.2017.11.006

Nezu AM, Nezu CM, D'Zurilla TJ. Problem-Solving Therapy: A Treatment Manual . New York; 2013. doi:10.1891/9780826109415.0001

Owens D, Wright-Hughes A, Graham L, et al. Problem-solving therapy rather than treatment as usual for adults after self-harm: a pragmatic, feasibility, randomised controlled trial (the MIDSHIPS trial) .  Pilot Feasibility Stud . 2020;6:119. doi:10.1186/s40814-020-00668-0

Sorsdahl K, Stein DJ, Corrigall J, et al. The efficacy of a blended motivational interviewing and problem solving therapy intervention to reduce substance use among patients presenting for emergency services in South Africa: A randomized controlled trial . Subst Abuse Treat Prev Policy . 2015;10(1):46. doi:doi.org/10.1186/s13011-015-0042-1

Margolis SA, Osborne P, Gonzalez JS. Problem solving . In: Gellman MD, ed. Encyclopedia of Behavioral Medicine . Springer International Publishing; 2020:1745-1747. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-39903-0_208

Kirkham JG, Choi N, Seitz DP. Meta-analysis of problem solving therapy for the treatment of major depressive disorder in older adults . Int J Geriatr Psychiatry . 2016;31(5):526-535. doi:10.1002/gps.4358

Garand L, Rinaldo DE, Alberth MM, et al. Effects of problem solving therapy on mental health outcomes in family caregivers of persons with a new diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment or early dementia: A randomized controlled trial . Am J Geriatr Psychiatry . 2014;22(8):771-781. doi:10.1016/j.jagp.2013.07.007

Noyes K, Zapf AL, Depner RM, et al. Problem-solving skills training in adult cancer survivors: Bright IDEAS-AC pilot study .  Cancer Treat Res Commun . 2022;31:100552. doi:10.1016/j.ctarc.2022.100552

Albert SM, King J, Anderson S, et al. Depression agency-based collaborative: effect of problem-solving therapy on risk of common mental disorders in older adults with home care needs . The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry . 2019;27(6):619-624. doi:10.1016/j.jagp.2019.01.002

By Arlin Cuncic, MA Arlin Cuncic, MA, is the author of The Anxiety Workbook and founder of the website About Social Anxiety. She has a Master's degree in clinical psychology.

A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

A lock ( ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

• Risk and Protective Factors
• Preventing Suicide
• Health Disparities in Suicide
• Suicide Facts
• Suicide Prevention Resources
• Funded Programs
• Comprehensive Suicide Prevention: Program Profiles
• Social Media Resources

Risk and Protective Factors for Suicide

• Suicide is rarely caused by a single circumstance or event.
• Many factors can reduce risk for suicide.
• Everyone can help prevent suicide.

Many factors contribute to suicide risk

A range of factors—at the individual, relationship, community, and societal levels —can increase suicide risk. These risk factors are situations or problems that can increase the possibility that a person will attempt suicide.

Circumstances that increase suicide risk

Individual Risk Factors

These personal factors contribute to risk:

• Previous suicide attempt
• History of depression and other mental illnesses
• Serious illness such as chronic pain
• Criminal/legal problems
• Job/financial problems or loss
• Impulsive or aggressive tendencies
• Substance use
• Current or prior history of adverse childhood experiences
• Sense of hopelessness
• Violence victimization and/or perpetration

Relationship Risk Factors

These harmful or hurtful experiences within relationships contribute to risk:

• Family/loved one's history of suicide
• Loss of relationships
• High conflict or violent relationships
• Social isolation

Community Risk Factors

These challenging issues within a person's community contribute to risk:

• Lack of access to healthcare
• Suicide cluster in the community
• Stress of acculturation
• Community violence
• Historical trauma
• Discrimination

Societal Risk Factors

These cultural and environmental factors within the larger society contribute to risk:

• Stigma associated with help-seeking and mental illness
• Easy access to lethal means of suicide among people at risk
• Unsafe media portrayals of suicide

Many factors protect against suicide risk

Similar to risk factors, a range of factors at the individual, relationship, community, and societal levels can protect people from suicide. We can take action in communities and as a society to support people and help protect them from suicidal thoughts and behavior.

Circumstances that protect against suicide risk

Individual Protective Factors

These personal factors protect against suicide risk:

• Effective coping and problem-solving skills
• Reasons for living (for example, family, friends, pets, etc.)
• Strong sense of cultural identity

Relationship Protective Factors

These healthy relationship experiences protect against suicide risk:

• Support from partners, friends, and family
• Feeling connected to others

Community Protective Factors

These supportive community experiences protect against suicide risk:

• Feeling connected to school, community, and other social institutions
• Availability of consistent and high quality physical and behavioral healthcare

Societal Protective Factors:

These cultural and environmental factors within the larger society protect against suicide risk:

• Reduced access to lethal means of suicide among people at risk
• Cultural, religious, or moral objections to suicide

Connections to violence

Suicide is connected to other forms of injury and violence. For example, people who have experienced violence, including child abuse, bullying, or sexual violence, have a higher suicide risk. Watch Moving Forward to learn how everyone benefits when we increase efforts to protect people from violence and reduce issues that put people at risk.

See Suicide Prevention Resources for articles and publications about risk and protective factors for suicide.

Do you know the warning signs for suicide?

If someone is at risk for suicide, you can watch for warning signs, including:

• Talking about being a burden
• Being isolated
• Increased anxiety
• Talking about feeling trapped or in unbearable pain
• Increased substance use
• Looking for a way to access lethal means
• Increased anger or rage
• Extreme mood swings
• Expressing hopelessness
• Sleeping too little or too much
• Talking or posting about wanting to die
• Making plans for suicide

Read CDC's June 2018 VitalSigns edition to learn more.

Need help? Know someone who does?

Contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline if you are experiencing mental health-related distress or are worried about a loved one who may need crisis support.

• Call or text 988
• Chat at 988lifeline.org

Connect with a trained crisis counselor. 988 is confidential, free, and available 24/7/365.

Visit the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline for more information at 988lifeline.org .

Suicide Prevention

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in the United States. Learn more about Suicide Prevention.

For Everyone

Public health.

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• Int J Environ Res Public Health

The Impact of Different Coping Styles on Psychological Distress during the COVID-19: The Mediating Role of Perceived Stress

1 Graduate School of Education, Fordham University, New York, NY 10023, USA; ude.mahdrof@4gnidy (Y.D.); ude.mahdrof@62gnawhj (J.H.)

2 Beijing Key Laboratory of Applied Experimental Psychology, National Demonstration Center for Experimental Psychology Education, Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China; moc.361@ysp_cxf (X.F.); moc.361@iewgnohysp (W.H.)

Jacqueline Hwang

3 Teachers’ College, Beijing Union University, Beijing 100874, China; nc.ude.unb.liam@aijgnaw

Associated Data

We do not provide public access to the data set due to protection of the privacy of the participants. Regarding the details of the data, please contact the corresponding author.

The present study aimed to understand the impact of different coping methods endorsed by Chinese college students during COVID-19 through the examination of the mediating role of perceived stress. We recruited a total of 492 undergraduate students to complete an online survey from May to June 2020. The results of structural equation modeling indicated that perceived stress was a significant mediator in the association between different coping styles and psychological distress. Three coping styles, including problem-focused, adaptive emotion-focused, and maladaptive emotion-focused coping styles were all significantly correlated with psychological distress. Perceived stress significantly mediated the association between the three coping styles and psychological distress. The results indicated a full mediation model in which problem-focused coping and adaptive emotion-focused coping affected psychological distress entirely through the mediation of perceived stress. Maladaptive emotion-focused coping positively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological distress through a partial mediation model. We discuss the implications of these findings and offer suggestions for future research.

1. Introduction

The novel coronavirus behind the current pandemic and disruption of life was given the name of “SARS-CoV-2” and the disease was also named “coronavirus disease 2019” (COVID-19; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC]) [ 1 ]. Wuhan, in the Hubei province of China, was the first city that reported the first case of COVID-19 in late December 2019. Quickly, the virus spread beyond Hubei Province, and Chinese authorities segregated the affected regions and immediately implemented nationwide mitigation measures according to the severity of the reported cases of COVID-19 [ 2 ]. Although local transmission of the virus was under control by April 2020 in China, COVID-19 had already spread worldwide. The World Health Organization (WHO) characterized COVID-19 as a pandemic (CDC) [ 3 ] on 11 March 2020.

University students have faced numerous challenges during the pandemic. In China, many universities suspended in-person classes and activities in Spring 2021 and through the summer session. Study abroad programs were cut short with universities asking their students to return home. Many university residence halls closed, giving students only a few days’ notice to vacate their dorm rooms [ 4 , 5 , 6 ]. Some academic disciplines did not allow for efficient online courses. Fieldwork, internships, and clinical rotations were suspended. Given the uncertainty of when life would return to normal [ 7 ], students felt uneasy about the course of their academic careers. Due to the effects of COVID-19, many students faced unprecedented stress regarding their living situations, financial burdens, graduation challenges, and job searches [ 8 ]. The present study aimed to examine the mediating role of perceived stress on the associations between three different coping styles and psychological distress during the COVID-19 pandemic through the transactional mode of stress and coping proposed by Lazarus and Folkman [ 9 ].

1.1. Coping Styles

Based on the transactional model of stress and coping developed by Lazarus and Folkman, personal and situational factors influence how one perceives and evaluates encountered situations. Variables within a person and the environment (e.g., beliefs, demands, and constraints) affect stress appraisal and coping strategy use, resulting in physiological and emotional reactions [ 9 ]. Coping could be described as humans’ cognitive and/or behavioral efforts that are used to cope with external and internal demands under a stressful circumstance [ 9 , 10 ].

There are different types of coping strategies. Emotion-focused coping is reactive and refers to attempting to regulate feelings and emotional responses to the stressor (e.g., anger, fear, sadness, anxiety, pressure). Problem-focused coping is proactive and refers to acting on the stressor, the environment, or oneself to address the problem in an attempt to decrease or eliminate the stress [ 10 ]. It was reported that it is more effective to use problem-focused coping in controllable stressful circumstances, but it is more effective to use emotion-focused coping in uncontrollable stressful circumstances [ 11 , 12 ]. A third type of coping, avoidance-focused coping, refers to cognitions and behaviors aimed at avoiding the stressful situation and reactions to it, such as distraction and diversion, and tends to be an initial reaction to stress [ 11 , 13 , 14 , 15 ].

In a study by Kumanova and Karastoyanov that investigated the associations between perceived stress and coping strategies, results showed that people who more often use specific proactive coping strategies, such as reflective coping and strategic planning; specific reactive problem-focused coping strategies, such as effective coping and planning ahead of time; and specific reactive emotion-focused strategies, such as reinterpretation from a positive perspective and growth, experience less stress. Conversely, people who more often use specific reactive emotion-focused coping approaches, such as focusing on emotions, denial, seeking emotional social support, and disengaging, experience more stress [ 16 ].

Different coping strategies also appear in response to different stressful situations. One study examined the relationship between stressors and coping in college students when the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic occurred, and researchers found that the active coping was predictive of life satisfaction and the avoidant coping was predictive of psychological symptoms. The results indicated that all types of coping buffered against negative impacts to health. In situations of uncontrollable, large-scale stressors, such as SARS 2003, any type of coping appears to help reduce stress [ 12 ]. In short, there have been mixed findings regarding coping styles and stress.

1.2. Psychological Distress

To slow down and contain the spread of COVID-19, many governments around the world have adopted suppression measures, such as lockdowns, quarantining at home, and bans of social gatherings and public events, which can lead to unintended mental health consequences for the public [ 17 ]. Brooks and colleagues identified some of the factors that might contribute to psychological distress in relation to these measures [ 18 ]. First, ongoing reports of COVID-19 outbreaks in different countries and regions through social media and the press are likely to increase individuals’ anxiety, depression, and fears associated with COVID-19. Second, both valid and invalid information about the negative consequences of COVID-19 might lead to higher levels of anxiety and depression. Third, high-risk individuals, such as the elderly and those with existing medical conditions, might suffer from more severe anxiety and depression.

In China, one of the major suppression measures has been confinement (e.g., staying at home during quarantine, banning of social gatherings). Confinement limits opportunities for social interaction, and it can negatively affect the mental health of vulnerable individuals [ 19 ]. Confinement can lead to increased psychological distress due to limited access to extended family and limited contact with people outside of the home [ 20 ]. Suppression measures have also altered conditions at work and school for many people. Many college students had to immediately transition from in-person instruction to fully virtual instruction, which dramatically increased the hours spent on teleworking for both academic activities and employment activities [ 21 ] and decreased the opportunities for physical activities [ 22 ]. Prolonged hours of teleworking and exclusive virtual learning can lead to mental fatigue and burnout [ 21 ].

1.3. The Mediating Role of Perceived Stress

If an individual perceives that the demands of a situation are beyond their own capabilities to deal with the circumstances, a sense of stress occurs [ 9 ]. The concept of perceived stress highlights that although people might experience the same event (e.g., the COVID-19 pandemic), it is their perception of the event that largely determines their stress response. Unprecedented stressors have affected university students as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic [ 5 , 23 ]. The degree to which people find a life situation stressful determines the degree of confidence they have in their ability to cope with that stressful situation. When an individual feels the general stressfulness of their life and realizes that their ability to handle such stress might be limited during specific situations, they perceive stress. In particular, perceived stress consists of factors such as feelings about circumstances that are uncontrollable or unpredictable in one’s life, how much change is occurring, and one’s confidence in one’s ability to deal with the presenting challenges [ 9 , 24 ].

Research has found that perceived stress is associated with self-efficacy, that is, high levels of perceived stress predict low levels of self-efficacy. Additionally, individuals who perceive a stressful situation as a challenge or an opportunity to prove themselves utilize coping skills more effectively and are less likely to think negatively [ 25 , 26 ]. Although all university students have been experiencing the same event, the COVID-19 pandemic, and are likely to cope with the pandemic using different coping styles, it is each student’s perception of the situation that dictates their level of stress, which in turn can affect the onset of psychological distresses, such as mental fatigue, anxiety, and depression.

1.4. Purpose of the Study

Although some previous studies examined copying styles, psychological distress, and perceived stress in numerous circumstances, none of them were conducted during a long-lasting public health crisis such as the COVID-19 which affected the public not only at the individual level, but also at the societal level. In addition, there is no single theory to fully support our theoretical model, which proposed to examine how and to what degree that the perceived stress might mediate the relations between copying styles and psychological distress. In the present study, the focus was to examine the mediating role of perceived stress in the associations between different coping styles and psychological distress among college students during COVID-19. The following questions were proposed: How do problem-focused coping, adaptive emotion-focused coping, and maladaptive emotion-focused coping affect mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic? Are there other potential mediation factors between three coping styles and mental health, such as psychological distress during the COVID-19 pandemic? The findings might provide insights to public health providers and mental health service providers in terms of how to provide prevention and intervention strategies to the public, especially during a public health crisis.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. participants.

This study was approved by Academic Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Psychology at Beijing Normal University. We recruited 492 Chinese students from two colleges in Beijing who completed the online survey between May and June 2020. The participants comprised 196 (39.8%) males and 296 (60.2%) females. Participants had an average age of 19.51 years (SD = 1.516), with an age range from 17 to 29. Because the public has been through multiple waves of the COVID-19 surges, it is important to explain the social context of the time when the study was implemented. The first COVID-19 case was identified in Wuhan, China in December of 2019. Starting on 3 February 2020, the Chinese authorities closed off Wuhan (a city of 11 million) by canceling planes and trains leaving the city, suspending buses, subways and ferries within it and quarantining the non-essential workers for about two months. After that, sporadic quarantine was conducted in different cities in China, based on the number of COVID-19 cases. Thus, in general, the public was under serious pressure due to uncertainty of the virus and the constantly changing policies enforced by the central or local government. During the time period of data collection, no COVID-19 vaccine was available to the public.

2.2. Measures

2.2.1. coping.

The measure of coping was adapted from the Brief COPE inventory [ 27 ]. This scale initially consisted of 14 subscales and there were two items for each subscale. Yeung and Fung [ 28 ] used one item for each subscale, and there were two categories of the items: problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping. The categories were separated into adaptive emotion-focused coping (e.g., “I’ve been looking for something positive in what is happening”) and maladaptive emotion-focused coping (e.g., “I’ve been using alcohol or other drugs to make myself feel better”). The Brief COPE consisted of 11 items, including three items for problem-focused coping, two items for adaptive emotion-focused coping, and six items for maladaptive emotion-focused coping. Two items that best fit the pandemic situation to measure adaptive emotion-focused coping were chosen, including “I’ve been looking for something good in what is happening” and “I’ve been accepting the reality of the fact which has happened.” Participants were directed to rate their coping during the peak time of COVID-19, ranging from 1 (none) to 5 (always). Cronbach’s α for the measure of coping was 0.794 in the present study. Cronbach’s α for problem-focused coping, adaptive emotion-focused coping, and maladaptive emotion-focused coping were 0.606, 0.823, and 0.772, respectively.

2.2.2. Perceived Stress

The measure for perceived stress was adapted from the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales [ 29 ]. The sample items were statements such as “Because of COVID-19, I find it difficult to relax.” Participants rated their perceived stress during the peak time of COVID-19, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The scale consisted of seven items. Cronbach’s α for perceived stress was 0.905 in the present study.

2.2.3. Psychological Distress

We measured psychological distress using the Chinese version of the 10-item Kessler Scale [ 30 ], which was adapted from Kessler et al. [ 31 ]. The scale consisted of 10 items. The sample items were statements such as “I felt so sad that nothing could cheer me up.” Participants were asked to rate their relatedness to presented factors during the peak time of COVID-19, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Cronbach’s α for psychological distress was 0.959 in the present study.

2.3. Data Analysis

We used SPSS 19.0 (IBM Corp., Armonk, N.Y., USA) to provide descriptive analyses of the variables, including the means, standard deviations, and Pearson correlations. Mplus 7.1 was used to examine the hypothetical model. We used maximum likelihood (ML) to handle the missing data. We used chi-square values (χ 2 ), the comparative fit index (CFI), the Tucker– Lewis fit index (TLI), the root-mean-square error of approximation (RMSEA), and the standardized root-mean-square residual (SRMR) to evaluate the models. In general, an acceptable model fit is indicated by CFI and TLI greater than 0.9 and RMSEA and SRMR less than 0.08.

3.1. Descriptive Statistics and Correlations

This study is all subjective self-reported data. To the validity of the results, we conducted a common method bias test. Harman’s single factor test result showed that the model fit was: χ 2 = 4275.297, CFI = 0.614, TLI = 0.583, RMSEA = 0.000, SRMR = 0.128. This model was unsatisfactory. Thus, this study did not have serious common method bias. We provide the means, standard deviations, and correlation coefficient in Table 1 . Three coping styles, perceived stress, and psychological distress were correlated with each other (r ranging from 0.093 to 0.595). Problem-focused coping was positively correlated with perceived stress and psychological distress. Adaptive emotion-focused coping was negatively correlated with perceived stress and psychological distress. Maladaptive emotion-focused coping was positively correlated with perceived stress and psychological distress.

Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations Among the Variables.

Note. Gender (1 = male, 2 = female). * p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001. M = Means; SD = Standard Deviations.

3.2. Examination of the Mediation Model

A multiple model (see Figure 1 ) with the three coping styles as independent variables, perceived stress as the mediator, and psychological distress as the dependent variable was established. The SEM results of the mediation model showed an acceptable model fit: χ 2 /df = 3.337, CFI = 0.923, TLI = 0.913, RMSEA = 0.069, SRMR = 0.077. As shown in Figure 1 , maladaptive emotion-focused coping directly and significantly predicted psychological distress. Maladaptive emotion-focused coping positively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological distress. Similarly, problem-focused coping positively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological distress. In addition, adaptive emotion-focused coping negatively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological distress. More importantly, problem-focused coping and adaptive emotion-focused coping did not directly predict psychological distress. The results indicated a full mediation model: problem-focused coping and adaptive emotion-focused coping affected psychological distress entirely through the mediation path.

Mediation model of the association between different coping styles and psychological distress. Note: all the loadings on latent variables were significant ( p < 0.001). *** p < 0.001. Pro = Problem-focused; Ada = Adaptive Emotion-focused Coping; Mal = Maladaptive Emotion-focused Coping; Per = Perceived Stress; Psy = Psychological Distress.

To further examine whether the indirect effects were significant, we used bias-corrected bootstrap tests derived from 1000 samples. As shown in Table 2 , maladaptive emotion-focused coping positively predicted psychological distress, while problem-focused coping and adaptive emotion-focused coping did not predict psychological distress. Perceived stress significantly mediated the association between the three coping styles—problem-focused coping, adaptive emotion-focused coping and maladaptive emotion-focused coping—and psychological distress.

Bias-corrected bootstrap tests on direct and indirect effects.

4. Discussion

Although previous studies examined the relations between coping styles, psychological distress, and perceived stress in the public, this study examined such relations in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic in Chinese college students in the country where the first case of COVID-19 was officially reported. First, the results showed that three coping styles were all significantly correlated with psychological distress in Chinese college students during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic. Adaptive emotion-focused coping was negatively associated with perceived stress and psychological distress. Maladaptive emotion-focused coping was positively associated with perceived stress and distress. These findings concur with those of Kumanova and Karastoyanov [ 16 ], suggesting that individuals who use specific reactive emotion-focused coping strategies more often, such as focusing on emotions, denial, seeking emotional social support, and disengaging, experience more stress.

Second, perceived stress significantly mediated the association between problem-focused, adaptive emotion-focused, and maladaptive emotion-focused coping and psychological distress. According to Lazarus and Folkman [ 9 ], perceived stress is associated with many psychological factors such as one’s feelings about the unpredictability and uncontrollability of a specific life circumstance, such as the COVID-19 outbreak, and confidence in their abilities to problem solve and cope with the difficulties. Research has suggested that perceived stress can be associated with self-efficacy (i.e., belief about one’s capacities to execute behaviors to achieve certain performance attainments) [ 24 , 32 ]. Previous studies have suggested that individuals who perceived a stressful situation as an opportunity or challenge to prove their abilities tended to utilize their coping skills more effectively and be less likely to have negative thoughts [ 25 , 26 ]. Although the COVID-19 pandemic has had an unprecedented impact on the public, individuals are likely to perceive and interpret the presented situations differently and utilize coping strategies differently, which might contribute to different levels of psychological distress.

Third, problem-focused and adaptive emotion-focused coping affected psychological distress entirely through the mediation path. The findings of the current study suggest that problem-focused and adaptive emotion-focused coping did not directly predict psychological distress. The impacts of problem-focused and adaptive emotion-focused coping on psychological distress were through the mediation role of perceived stress in this study. The associated consequences and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic continue to pose a major challenge to the public. Preventive measures and social distancing requirements have been developed and mandated to contain the spread of the virus and are still ongoing in specific regions [ 33 ]. College students have faced a number of challenges, such as sudden closures of university dormitories, cancellation of all in-person instruction and field placements (e.g., practicums and internships), the loss of off-campus jobs that require in-person contact, lack of in-person social support from peers and instructors, and a dramatic reduction in outdoor physical activities [ 34 ]. According to Lazarus [ 35 ], perceived stress is experienced subjectively by an individual, who might identify an imbalance between the demands placed on them and the available resources to deal such demands. While the rapidly changing societal situations associated with COVID-19 may have appeared to be uncontrollable to some participants, others might have perceived the situation differently, and thus might have subjectively experienced different levels of psychological distress. The findings suggest that mental health providers might want to target strategies and resources that could alleviate perceived stress in the individuals when an uncontrollable pandemic such as the COVID-19 occurs. In other words, individuals might not be able to change the external environment in the context of COVID-19 pandemic, but subjectively changing one’s perception and interpretation of a stressful event might help reduce perceived stress.

The literature has linked exposure to acute stress to both short-term or long-term physical and psychological disorders. Cannon [ 36 ] outlined that the human body copes with acute stressors by utilizing emotional and motivational systems. When encountering stressful situations, the human body’s sympathetic nervous system initiates the “fight or flight response,” such as faster heart rate, rapid breathing rate, and excessive sweating. In turn, the parasympathetic responses are diminished to cope with the stressor. Over time, the human body might become exhausted, and such response eventually leads to physical burnout and psychological distress. According to Melamed et al. [ 37 ], when an individual is emotionally exhausted and does not have the resources to cope with encountered stressors, psychological burnout and distress might occur. Thus, perceived stress experienced by an individual might directly dictate the pervasiveness and severity of the psychological distress of the individual.

Fourth, different coping styles appear to have differentiated impacts on mental health. Based on the transactional theory, stress can be viewed as an interactive process between the stressors, such as environmental circumstances that negatively affects one’s well-being, and one’s psychological responses, such as appraisal, adjustment, and coping [ 9 ]. Based on Lazarus and Folkman (1984), one coping strategy is emotion-focused coping. In the present study, maladaptive emotion-focused coping (e.g., refusal, avoidance, escape, use of alcohol) was separated from adaptive emotion-focused coping (e.g., accepting the reality, or looking for positive aspects in life challenges). Maladaptive emotion-focused coping could lead to passive or avoidant coping. In a stressful situation, it is common that individuals resort to avoidant coping in order to reduce the emotional stress elicited by a challenging situation, rather than directly problem solving and handling the stress at the source [ 38 ]. In a situation where individuals feel that they have little control over the situation, they tend to default to avoidant coping [ 39 ]. In the current study, maladaptive emotion-focused coping positively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological distress. This finding was consistent with Compas et al. [ 40 ], who suggested that maladaptive emotion-focused coping, such as avoidance coping, has been associated with higher levels of psychological distress and more depressive symptoms. In the current study, adaptive emotion-focused coping negatively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological distress. This finding suggested that the use of positive emotion-focused coping, such as reappraisal and assigning positive meaning to ordinary events, might help buffer against depressed mood [ 41 ] and acute stress [ 42 ]. In other words, when the external event is uncontrollable such as the COVID-19 pandemic, one could resort to focusing on positive aspects of one’s emotion in order to reduce perceived stress, leading to lower level of psychological distress.

In general, active problem-focused coping has been related to lower psychological distress [ 40 , 43 ]. Surprisingly, problem-focused coping in the present study positively predicted perceived stress, which in turn positively predicted psychological stress. Given the unprecedented severity and pervasiveness of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, most individuals have never encountered such a global event. Even when individuals attempt problem-solving approaches, they have little control over the rapidly changing situations related to the COVID-19, such as public health policy changes, school closures, losing a job due to business closure, having no access to public facilities, and staying in an isolated environment for a prolonged period due to quarantine policy. During the COVID-19 pandemic, even when individuals engage in active coping and problem solving, they cannot change the global situation, and infection rates in different regions continue to fluctuate. It is plausible that the more individuals actively engage in problem solving related to COVID-19, the more they ruminate and worry about the situation, leading to higher levels of perceived stress and higher levels of reported psychological distress. Gan and colleagues [ 44 ] examined coping strategies by college students in response to SARS-related stressors. The results showed that participants reported using more avoidant coping with SARS-related stressors that, like COVID-19, were uncontrollable. Such findings suggest that individuals’ coping styles during an unprecedented and sudden COVID-19 pandemic might be different from their coping styles during a typical circumstance, and such difference warrants a differential examination.

There are several limitations of this study that should be noted. First, the study was based on self-reported questionnaires, which might produce potential biases, although our factor analysis results did not indicate a serious common method bias. Second, we recruited undergraduate students exclusively from two universities in Beijing. It is likely that those who responded to the survey were the individuals who wanted to have a voice and were interested in such a research topic. These college students represented highly educated young people in a metropolitan area in China where the societal and public health resources are relatively abundant. Because of this sampling, the findings of this study might not be generalizable to a population with lower educational attainment and more vulnerable occupational status, or to those in other geographical areas. Third, the survey was conducted fully online. Researchers were unable to reach individuals who might not have had internet access during the early stages of the COVID-19 outbreak; such individuals might have been more vulnerable, and might have perceived higher levels of stress associated with COVID-19. Fourth, the present study only focused on the relations between psychological distress, perceived stress, and three types of coping. There might other factors such as subclinical symptoms and emotional difficulties that might affect students’ self-reporting. Such factors should be further explored in future studies.

Future researchers are encouraged to examine a more general population in more diverse regions to capture perceived stress and psychological distress in individuals with different levels of educational attainment, different occupational statuses, and in different regions. Future researchers should consider other measures that could better reflect perceived stress and psychological distress in addition to self-reported questionnaires.

5. Conclusions

The present study was to explore the impact of different coping styles on psychological distress during the COVID-19 outbreak among college students in China. The problem-focused and maladaptive emotion-focused coping styles were positively correlated with perceived stress and psychological distress. The maladaptive emotion-focused coping style was negatively correlated with perceived stress and psychological distress. It appears that adaptive, emotion-focused coping could alleviate the mental discomfort associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. The mediating role of perceived stress between the associations of three coping styles and psychological distress found that problem-focused coping and adaptive emotion-focused coping affected psychological distress entirely through the mediation path, in which perceived stress was the mediator. Perceived stress partially mediated the association between maladaptive emotion-focused coping and psychological distress. The findings underscore the importance of perceived stress and provide insights for future intervention. Our findings suggest that mental health service providers might consider providing strategies to help clients reduce their perceived stress. During uncontrollable public health emergencies, strategies and resources that could alleviate one’s perceived stress appear to buffer psychological distress.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization of ideas, Y.D. and X.F.; methodology, X.F.; use of software, X.F.; validation, Y.D., X.F. and R.L.; data analysis, X.F.; implementation of the survey, X.F. and W.H.; funding resources, R.L.; data curation, X.F.; writing—original manuscript draft preparation, Y.D.; writing—editing and revising, J.H.; visualization, Y.D.; supervision, J.W.; project management, R.L.; funding acquisition, R.L. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

We thank the funding support from the National Social Science Fund of China, grant number 17BSH102 (awarded to Rude Liu).

Institutional Review Board Statement

This project was approved by the Academic Ethics Committee at Beijing Normal University (approval date: 3 December 2017).

Informed Consent Statement

Subjects involved in the study filled out the informed consent.

Data Availability Statement

Conflicts of interest.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

School counselor

Job posting for school counselor at keystone school.

Keystone School helps bright, talented and motivated young people realize their full potential. In our academically accelerated program, faculty and staff challenge and nurture young people throughout their educational journey.

Keystone students achieve in academics, arts, sciences, athletics and other diverse interests, while supporting and challenging each other.

As students grow from preschool through high school, expert and caring teachers guide their inquiries. Keystone students gain admission to the country’s most prestigious colleges and universities, win highly competitive scholarships, and go on to create fulfilling careers and lives.

We are searching for a capable and dedicated School Counselor to join our excellent team. The counselor’s responsibilities include creating an environment of support for emotional and social development and ensuring the well-being of students in grades 5-12.

At Keystone, we firmly believe in our students

Doing Well by Being Well.

In addition the counselor will create, implement, and oversee developmentally appropriate Social and Emotional Learning programs for students, faculty / staff, and families.

To be successful as a counselor, you should be a curious, lifelong learner with a passion for discovery. Outstanding candidates have a deep respect for learning and the ability to inspire others.

Counselor Responsibilities

Provide emotional support to needs of students and families that arise as a result of life circumstances or those issues that may arise at school

Assist students in developing adaptive coping strategies / skills that can be used in managing difficult or strong emotions, conflict or relationship challenges, and friendships

In partnership with other administrators, develop, coordinate, and present programs for students, faculty / staff, and families on social-emotional topics

Work in close coordination with faculty and division heads on any concerns or issues that arise in the classroom or during the school day, ensuring that approach to behavioral and emotional concerns is coordinated, comprehensive, and developmentally appropriate

Should any extraordinary situations arise (e.g., illness or death in the family, divorce, separation, or remarriage, job loss, serious concern of student mental health, etc.

provide emotional support to children and families, provide pertinent resources (e.g., books, articles), and if necessary, appropriate community referrals for appropriate mental health support and service.

Middle School

Through Town Hall and advisory, lead discussions and provide information about social and emotional challenges facing middle school children and assist students in developing adaptive coping strategies and problem-solving skills to handle potential difficulties in healthy and constructive ways

Upper School

Co-teach / facilitate Wellness Class (Self and Community) to all incoming 9th grade students designed to support students in developing skills to enhance well-being, and engage in problem solving / encourage responsible choices when faced with challenges

Sponsor Wellness Council to help students lead discussions and plan events centered around areas of personal health and wellness during two weekly CASA sessions.

Coordinate and assist in execution of annual Service Day, including building relationships with multiple community service organizations / opportunities

Coordinate and assist in execution of annual sexual health, substance use and other programs provided by outside vendors.

Greater Keystone Community :

Provide opportunities for faculty and staff development around salient student mental health and wellness in topics such as suicide prevention and anxiety

Organize and provide school wide opportunities for dissemination of information around pertinent student mental health and wellness in topics such as effective communication strategies involving difficult topics and anxiety

Requirements :

Master's degree in Counseling from an accredited college or university

Valid Texas School Counselor certificate as required by the State Board of Education Certification

Two years teaching experience

Thorough understanding of school operations

Strong organizational, communication, and interpersonal skills

Ability to coordinate campus support operations

• Mental demands : Ability to solve problems and deal with a variety of situations; ability to interpret a variety of data;
• ability to interpret TEC and policy; ability to apply knowledge of current research and theory, ability to be effective in both oral and written communication;

ability to maintain emotional control under stress

Practical experience with MS Office, Google Classroom, and other software.

The ability to answer sensitive questions and create an environment where everyone’s opinions are respected.

Strong communication, interpersonal, and problem-solving skills.

Knowledge of current classroom technologies such as interactive whiteboard software, LMS software, Microsoft Office 365, Google Apps for Education, etc.

We recognize that diverse teams make the strongest teams, and we encourage people from all backgrounds to apply. We don't just accept difference -it's one of our key values.

Keystone School welcomes candidates for admission or employment, regardless of age, race, culture, gender, sexual orientation, religion, socio-economic status, national or ethnic origin, and does not discriminate on the basis of any category protected by law in the administration of any of its programs.

For more information about Keystone School, please visit

www.keystoneschool.org

Last updated : 2024-05-20

Apply for this job

Receive alerts for other School counselor job openings

Report this Job

Salary.com Estimation for School counselor in San Antonio, TX

$52,190 - $69,461

For Employer

Looking to price a job for your company?

Sign up to receive alerts about other jobs that are on the School counselor career path.

Click the checkbox next to the jobs that you are interested in.

Sign up to receive alerts about other jobs with skills like those required for the School counselor .

Account Reconciliation Skill

• Adjustment Clerk II Income Estimation: $36,330 - $48,660
• Wire Transfer Clerk II Income Estimation: $37,791 - $47,612

Behavioral Therapy Management Skill

• Intake Coordinator Income Estimation: $54,753 - $71,658
• Addiction Mental Health Assessor Income Estimation: $56,103 - $64,412

Not the job you're looking for? Here are some other School counselor jobs in the San Antonio, TX area that may be a better fit.

We don't have any other school counselor jobs in the san antonio, tx area right now..

St. Mary Magdalen Catholic School , San Antonio, TX

Elementary School Counselor

East Central Independent School District , San Antonio, TX

Column: How ‘Sesame Street’ can prepare kids for climate disasters

• Show more sharing options
• Copy Link URL Copied!

Twenty-three years ago, “Sesame Street” aired a remarkable series of episodes during which the iconic puppets and their human friends must recover from a hurricane. One focus is Big Bird’s struggle to come to terms with the destruction of his nest.

“I’m angry at that hurricane for wrecking my home,” he tells his companions. “I feel sad.”

PBS re-aired versions of the episodes after Hurricane Charley struck Florida in 2004, and again after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans a year later, and again after Hurricane Sandy slammed the Northeast. The latest rerun began with longtime “Sesame Street” resident Gordon Robinson (Roscoe Orman) offering a word of guidance to parents and other caregivers.

“Every year, there are a number of natural disasters that affect many people. Even if you are not directly affected, the television coverage of these events can be scary, especially to young children,” he said. “Several years ago, we featured a weeklong story about a hurricane on ‘Sesame Street.’ This storyline allowed us to provide children with strategies to help them cope with their emotions when faced with a natural disaster. So watch with your child and talk about any fears or concerns he or she might have.”

You're reading Boiling Point

Sammy Roth gets you up to speed on climate change, energy and the environment. Sign up to get it in your inbox twice a week.

You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.

From there, the show launched into its hopeful, happy-go-lucky theme song:

“Sunny day Sweepin’ the clouds away On my way to where the air is sweet Can you tell me how to get How to get to Sesame Street?”

Discordant? Maybe a little.

But also poignant — and hopefully a sign of powerful stories to come, as Big Bird and friends tackle the climate crisis.

As financiers and industry titans sounded off at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills this month — ExxonMobil Chief Executive Darren Woods served up misleading views on climate, while Tesla’s Elon Musk warned about artificial intelligence leading to the destruction of civilization — the people behind “Sesame Street” offered a decidedly humbler announcement.

Sesame Workshop — the New York nonprofit that’s been producing the show for 55 years — said it would partner with the global charity Save the Children to “foster young children’s climate resilience.” Basically, the organizations intend to work together to tell stories — starring Elmo, Cookie Monster, Grover and company — that will help kids and their families prepare for the increasingly extreme storms, floods, droughts and other weather extremes already being worsened by coal, oil and gas pollution.

Sherrie Westin, president of Sesame Workshop, said one goal is emotional well-being — helping kids learn to cope with an issue they’ll deal with their whole lives, even if we quickly phase out fossil fuels and avoid far more dangerous consequences.

“We know how important it is to reach children in those critical early years. It’s when their brain is developing faster than at any other time,” Westin said at a Milken conference panel led by Willow Bay, dean of USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. “We’re talking about giving [children] tools at an early age, helping them develop problem-solving, give them a sense of agency, so that they can feel empowered to take care of themselves, their communities.”

“Sesame Street” has always been part entertainment, part education, with lessons running the gamut from the alphabet to racial tolerance — typically backed up by rigorous research . The show hasn’t shied away from environmental stories in the past.

But although the venture into climate programming is new, it’s hardly out of step with the rest of the entertainment industry.

Last month, the Walt Disney Co. promised to replace the gas-guzzling ride vehicles at Disneyland’s Autopia attraction with electric cars, after a pressure campaign by climate activists. A year earlier, NBCUniversal launched its GreenerLight Program, with a goal of incorporating sustainability themes in films released by Universal Pictures, Focus Features and DreamWorks Animation.

Our world is changing fast. It makes sense that the “Sesame” creators want to help children learn to live in that world.

So what might that look like in practice?

Intrigued by the Milken panel — which featured a guest appearance by Grover! — I reached out to Sesame Workshop and Save the Children. Although many details are still being worked out, Save the Children’s president, Janti Soeripto, told me some of the programming will be extremely direct. For instance, the organizations hope to teach kids in developing countries in particular — in refugee camps, for instance — where to go when a hurricane or a flood hits, and how to keep their families safe.

They’ll make sure kids know about climate solutions, too.

One example: “for children in Sierra Leone [to learn] that the mangrove forest plays a really important role in carbon capture, for the world ... and what they can do to help preserve it, without making their community lose their livelihoods,” Soeripto said.

“Every single country or region will have its own climate and natural issues that children need to learn,” she added.

Introducing kids to climate solutions — and teaching them how to safeguard themselves and their loved ones from disasters it’s too late to avoid — will hopefully help them grapple with a growing sense of despair that’s prevalent among young people .

“Climate anxiety is real,” Westin said.

“And it’s here now. It’s not just in the future,” Soeripto said.

Global warming is overwhelming, as Grover noted during his Milken conference cameo. As much as people love “Sesame Street,” can a single TV show really prepare millions of children around the world for supercharged storms, floods and fires?

There’s academic research suggesting that maybe it can.

In 2019, economists Melissa Kearney and Phillip Levine co-authored a peer-reviewed study finding that preschool-age kids who had access to “Sesame Street” when it first aired in 1969 did better in school than those who didn’t — with long-lasting effects. They determined that students who lived in parts of the U.S. where they were able to see the initial broadcasts were 14% more likely to be attending the age-appropriate grade years later, in middle school and high school.

That doesn’t mean “Sesame Street” will be a climate game-changer in the 2020s — especially with far more shows and games for today’s kids to choose from. It’s a different world from the one in which ABC, CBS, NBC and PBS were the main options.

Still, Levine — a professor at Wellesley College — suspects Elmo and his pals can help bend the climate narrative a bit.

“There’s very good evidence on the immediate impact of watching the show,” he said.

Marie-Louise Mares, a professor of communication arts at University of Wisconsin-Madison, feels similarly.

In 2013, she and her colleague Zhongdang Pan conducted a peer-reviewed analysis of two dozen existing studies exploring how “Sesame Street” had affected the education of more than 10,000 children around the world. Their analysis was commissioned by Sesame Workshop, as were some of the studies they examined. But the nonprofit stayed out of the research, Mares told me.

There were a few areas where “Sesame Street” didn’t seem to have much influence on early childhood learning, she said. But on the whole, the show had many positive effects, including better literacy, numeracy and health and safety knowledge.

As for climate change, “it definitely makes sense to me that ‘Sesame Street’ could be effective,” she said.

For that to happen, though, Sesame Workshop and Save the Children will need some money.

They’re trying to raise $500,000 — not that much in the grand scheme of global philanthropy — to launch a pilot in Bangladesh, where Sesame Workshop has been co-producing the show “Sisimpur” for nearly two decades, and where extreme temperatures, one of the deadliest consequences of fossil fuel combustion, have recently kept tens of millions of kids home from school.

The nonprofits will try to share “Sesame Street” stories with families that don’t have television sets or even electricity — perhaps by following a model that Sesame Workshop utilized during the Syrian refugee crisis , which involved trained facilitators delivering Arabic-language “Ahlan Simsim” programming to schoolchildren through WhatsApp group calls. New York University researchers found that the WhatsApp calls were remarkably beneficial for language, numeracy and social-emotional development skills.

Eventually, Sesame Workshop and Save the Children hope to raise $5 million to expand the initiative to the U.S. and elsewhere.

“We also have a lot of data that shows that even though you’re creating content that’s essentially for a child, it becomes a catalyst for adult behavior change,” Westin said. “It’s one of the very few children’s properties that also appeals to adults.”

I don’t have strong recollections of watching “Sesame Street” as a toddler, but my mom tells me that I absolutely adored Elmo — “Emmo” was one of my first words — and that I must have learned a lot. She said I was walking around a social hall a few months after my first birthday when I spotted a trash can and excitedly blurted out, “Ocka!” — a reference to Oscar the Grouch.

Watching the hurricane episodes, I’m sad to say I didn’t feel much nostalgia. But I understood what Westin meant about the cross-generational appeal. I chuckled at a few in-jokes, and at a silly storyline involving an overly zealous building inspector.

I also had no trouble imagining how “Sesame Street” could be put to good use for climate purposes.

The hurricane episodes didn’t mention the climate crisis explicitly. But they did feature the key elements the show will need as its writers, producers, actors and puppeteers begin to confront these topics — a character coping with climate anxiety (Big Bird) and a resilience of spirit that leaves viewers feeling hopeful there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, even when it’s hard to see.

As Gordon counsels his grief-stricken friend, “You’re right, Big Bird, it’s not alright. But it will be alright.”

The storyline concludes with the “Sesame Street” crew helping Big Bird rebuild his nest. Everything is OK. A happy ending.

With global warming, the conclusions won’t be so simple. I wonder how the show will navigate that treacherous terrain.

However it works out, I’m glad Elmo and Oscar are going to try.

“Come and play Everything’s A-OK Friendly neighbors there That’s where we meet Can you tell me how to get How to get to Sesame Street?”

This column is the latest edition of Boiling Point, an email newsletter about climate change and the environment in California and the American West. You can sign up for Boiling Point here . And for more climate and environment news, follow @Sammy_Roth on X.

Toward a more sustainable California

Get Boiling Point, our newsletter exploring climate change, energy and the environment, and become part of the conversation — and the solution.

Sammy Roth is the climate columnist for the Los Angeles Times. He writes the twice-weekly Boiling Point newsletter and focuses on clean energy solutions. He previously reported for the Desert Sun and USA Today, where he covered renewable energy and public lands. He grew up in Westwood and would very much like to see the Dodgers win the World Series again.

More From the Los Angeles Times

Climate & Environment

Dead baby sea lions showing up along California coastal islands. Researchers aren’t sure why

May 23, 2024

World & Nation

Botanists scour the U.S.-Mexico border to document forgotten ecosystem split by border wall

In striking before-and-after photos, a parched Lake Shasta is transformed

Good news for desert tortoises: Stretch of Mojave Desert gets federal protections