Proactive
/pɹoʊˈæk.tɪv/ adj
adj ·Uncommon ·College level
Definitions
Adjective
- 1 Acting in advance to deal with an expected change or difficulty.
"We can deal with each problem as it pops up, or we can take a proactive stance and try to prevent future problems."
Adjective
- 1 (of a policy or person or action) controlling a situation by causing something to happen rather than waiting to respond to it after it happens wordnet
- 2 descriptive of any event or stimulus or process that has an effect on events or stimuli or processes that occur subsequently wordnet
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"School busing and taking a proactive stance against discrimination were hotly debated topics."
Etymology
From pro- + active; originally coined 1933 by Paul Whiteley and Gerald Blankfort in a psychology paper, used in technical sense. Used in a popular context and sense (courage, perseverance) in 1946 book Man’s Search for Meaning by neuropsychiatrist Viktor Emil Frankl, in the context of dealing with the Holocaust, as contrast with reactive.