Pushing means you want to push other players out of the pot. You want as few opponents competing with you as possible. Usually you accomplish pushing by playing aggressively.
Pulling means you want to pull as many opponents into the pot with you as possible, in general so that you'll get paid off by more opponents on the river. You might limp rather than raise when you want more opponents.

Steve Badger explains it rather well:
http://www.playwinningpoker.com/poker/schooling/

Buzz

I haven't thought about this a lot, but off the top of my head, I would clarify that LO8 and LHE are not different in pushing/pulling (in terms of the reasons why, and what these terms actually mean), but that the scenarios that arise are different.

You push to get the hand to as few people as possible when your hand plays better with fewer people in the pot. You pull to get as many bets in from as many people as possible, which will basically occur as a result of a draw.

In LO8, with a big draw (but no showdown value), you want as many bets from as many people as possible. This is the same in LHE, you will have hands like suited connectors that want to "pull".

In LO8, you'll have scenarios (maybe with a weak made hand in one or both ways) where you want to push people out of the pot to improve your chances of scooping or promoting your one side of the pot. In LHE, you also push when you have a made (but vulnerable) hand that is more likely to scoop (win) if you eliminate opponents. Raising top pair on the flop is an example.

Now, in both games, there is a 3rd scenario, where you have a monstrous made hand that is basically the nuts. In that case, you want as many bets from as many players. I guess this would be considered more pulling than pushing, but the reality is that in LO8 almost no hand is invulnerable, whereas in LHE you will more often have a hand that is (relatively) difficult to draw out on. So this consideration is less important in LO8 -- if you have the nut low and nut flush on the turn, you are sticking in as many bets as possible just from a value point of view. You're not pushing to get rid of people, and you're not pulling on a draw. You're just betting/raising/sticking in as many bets as possible for value.

your last point connects well with my second thought.
the desire to protect often deprives people of possible value...

I agree with this. Both have their pushing and pulling hands (e.g., KQ offsuit plays poorly multiway in HE), but the nature of which hands you play that way and way differs between the two games.

It is all about maximizing value, always, but often the value is maximized by inducing opponents to fold equity. If they'll ever fold, of course....


You stated it well above. Many, me included, have a tendency to overprotect and dissuade our opponents from making bad calls. However.... that derives from playing in loose live games. If our opponents are getting 20+:1 to call a single flop bet, they're often going to call with any backdoor piece of anything. There's probably a lot to be said for waiting for the turn to raise so that we can get them to make incorrect calls (like the KK vs J7s hand in SSHE), which isn't something I've done a lot of because I usually have the initiative on the flop and don't expect to get bet into.

Thanks. I was aware of these concepts of course but not the terms.