Avoidance, and what to try instead
When something feels hard, avoiding it brings quick relief. You don’t answer the text, you stay in bed a little longer, you put off the call.
The trouble is the cost that comes later. The text gets harder to answer, the day gets shorter, and the call still needs making. Over time, avoidance can shrink a life and keep mood low.
Behavioral activation looks closely at these moments. What happened? How did you feel? What did you do, what did it help you get away from, and how did things go afterward? Then, what could you try instead?
Avoidance doesn’t always look like doing nothing. Scrolling, sleeping in, keeping busy with easy chores, or going over a problem in your head can all be ways of staying away from something harder.
The other choice is usually small and specific, and it moves toward the thing you were avoiding. Reply with one line. Get up and open the curtains. Call for two minutes. The app’s avoidance page walks through these questions, and the last answer can become a plan. On paper, the When I notice I’m avoiding something worksheet asks the same four.
Seeing the pattern once rarely changes it. It gets easier with practice, and a therapist can help you look at the patterns that keep coming back.
If what you’re avoiding brings strong fear or panic, or is tied to something traumatic, work on it with a therapist rather than on your own.
Why relief is so convincing
Avoidance is hard to give up because it works, right away. Getting out of something unpleasant brings relief, and relief makes you more likely to do the same thing next time. Psychologists call this negative reinforcement. Charles Ferster, one of the first to describe depression in behavioral terms, saw escape and avoidance as a big part of what keeps it going.
The costs work on a different clock. They arrive slowly, and they’re easy to miss, because by the time they show up the moment of avoiding is long past. Part of what this page and the avoidance page do is connect the two.
TRAP and TRAC
The approach here comes from Christopher Martell, Michael Addis, and Neil Jacobson, who gave it two short names.
TRAP stands for trigger, response, and avoidance pattern. Something happens, you feel something, and you do something that gets you away from it.
TRAC keeps the trigger and the response and swaps the avoidance for alternative coping, something that moves you toward what you’d been staying away from.
The avoidance page asks the same things in plain words. What happened is the trigger. How you felt is the response. What you did, and what it did for you, is the avoidance pattern and what it got you. What you could try instead is the alternative.
Working through one
A friend texts on Thursday to ask you to dinner on Saturday. That’s the trigger.
You feel tired and heavy, and you worry you’d be bad company. That’s the response.
You don’t answer, and you watch TV all evening. It spares you the effort and the worry that night. Afterward you feel more alone, and the text is harder to answer the next day. That’s the avoidance pattern, with its quick relief and its later cost.
What could you try instead? Reply today, and suggest a short coffee on Sunday instead of a whole dinner. It moves toward your friend, and it’s small enough to actually do.
The forms avoidance takes
In a study that built a questionnaire on avoidance and depression, Nicole Ottenbreit and Keith Dobson described four kinds, crossing what you do and what you think with social and nonsocial situations.
- Doing, with people. Turning down invitations, letting messages sit, sitting at the edge of the room.
- Doing, on your own. Putting off a bill, a form, an appointment, or a job application.
- Thinking, with people. Trying not to think about a strained relationship, or a conversation that needs to happen.
- Thinking, on your own. Pushing away thoughts about money, health, or work, or not letting yourself think about a decision that needs making.
A questionnaire therapists sometimes use to follow behavioral activation over time, the Behavioral Activation for Depression Scale, has a whole section on avoidance and going over things in your head. Martell treats that kind of going over things as avoidance too. “Getting out of your head” has more on it.
What to try instead
A useful alternative is small enough to do today and specific enough to plan, and it points toward what you were avoiding rather than away from it. It doesn’t have to solve the whole problem.
- Avoiding a stack of unopened mail? Open the envelopes tonight, without dealing with them yet.
- Avoiding a friend you haven’t talked to in months? Send two lines.
- Avoiding the gym after a long break? Drive there and walk in, even if you stay ten minutes.
- Avoiding a hard conversation with your partner? Ask when would be a good time to talk this week.
After you try it
Martell and his colleagues sum up the steps after spotting a TRAP with the word ACTION. Assess what the behavior does for you, choose to keep it or try something else, try it, integrate the new choice into your routine, observe what happens, and never give up.
In everyday terms, notice what happened after you tried the alternative, how it felt, and what came after. One try rarely changes much. Most people need several before an old pattern starts to loosen.
Avoidance or a good choice?
Not every no is avoidance. Saying no to protect your rest, or staying away from someone who treats you badly, can be exactly right. The same action can be either one.
The test is what it does for you over the coming weeks, not only right now. Does it move you toward what matters to you, or away from it? If you’re not sure, try the alternative once and see.
References
- Martell, C. R., Addis, M. E., & Jacobson, N. S. (2001). Depression in context: Strategies for guided action. W. W. Norton.
- Martell, C. R., Dimidjian, S., & Herman-Dunn, R. (2021). Behavioral activation for depression: A clinician’s guide (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
- Ferster, C. B. (1973). A functional analysis of depression. American Psychologist, 28(10), 857–870. doi.org/10.1037/h0035605
- Ottenbreit, N. D., & Dobson, K. S. (2004). Avoidance and depression: The construction of the Cognitive-Behavioral Avoidance Scale. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 42(3), 293–313. doi.org/10.1016/S0005-7967(03)00140-2
- Kanter, J. W., Mulick, P. S., Busch, A. M., Berlin, K. S., & Martell, C. R. (2007). The Behavioral Activation for Depression Scale (BADS): Psychometric properties and factor structure. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 29(3), 191–202. doi.org/10.1007/s10862-006-9038-5
Helpful links
- Psychology Tools: Behavioral activation
- Centre for Clinical Interventions: Back from the Bluez, a self-help workbook for depression
Everyday Insight’s tools are for education and personal reflection. They are not therapy or medical care, and they are not for emergencies. In an emergency, call 911. If you are in crisis in the United States, call or text 988. Mental health resources