Johari Window

The Johari window is a simple model of self-awareness: a square with four panes showing what you and other people know about you. Created in 1955 by the psychologists Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham, who named it from their first names, it’s used in groups, training and coaching to show how sharing and feedback make you better known.

Also called: the Johari model; the four-pane model of self-awareness.

How it works

Open (the arena): what you know about yourself and others know too.
Blind (the blind spot): what others see and you don’t. You interrupt. You go quiet when criticised.
Hidden (the facade): what you know and keep to yourself. A fear, a debt, a diagnosis.
Unknown: what nobody has seen yet. A talent, or how you’d react to something you haven’t faced.

Two things move the lines. Disclosure (telling someone) moves material from hidden to open. Feedback (hearing someone) moves it from blind to open.

Examples

A colleague tells you that you sound angry on calls. You had no idea. That was blind; now it’s open.
In a therapy group you say, for the first time, that you failed your professional exam twice. Hidden becomes open, and nobody leaves the room.

Uses

Trainers and coaches use it to teach feedback. In medical training, researchers found that making it normal to admit limits, asking for feedback, and giving it without judgement all widen the open pane. In group therapy the window describes what the group does: members disclose, and get honest feedback they can’t get elsewhere.

In Nigeria

Many of us are trained to keep the hidden pane large: don’t wash your linen outside. That protects you, and it keeps you alone with it. A group or a therapist is a safe place to move one thing from hidden to open.

Johari window vs introspection

Introspection is looking inward on your own; it can only reach the open and hidden panes. The Johari window adds other people, which is the only way into the blind pane.

When to get help

If feedback feels unbearable, or nobody is allowed into the hidden pane, a therapist or a group is a safe place to practise. You can book a licensed therapist on Mytherapist.ng for self-esteem and emotional skills.