I think you could definitely see it as a coping mechanism (although I tend to think it's in him pretty damn deep, since the times you see him with the least opportunity to think are exactly when he tends to leap directly in; he seems more likely to talk himself out of heroics than into them), but I guess my point is that if you have an anxiety *disorder,* you can't just choose to buck up and go forward as if you weren't scared -- that's what makes it a disorder. So Stiles' anxiety "issues" don't seem to rise to that level, which just means -- he's anxious some of the time! Which most of us are! I feel like they want to talk about it as if it's some kind of hindrance to his life, but we basically never see him hindered from doing anything he wants to do by anxiety.

I still really like the way he and Scott trade off on "we're all going to die!" / "pull yourself together, man!" Only one of them is allowed to freak out at a time, and it is first come, first served.