SCARF

SCARF is a model that explains how social situations produce threat or reward in the brain. The framework developed by David Rock rests on five domains: Status, Certainty, Autonomy, Relatedness, and Fairness. When one of these domains is felt to be under threat, a person moves into defense and thinking narrows. In coaching and leadership, it serves to read the real trigger beneath a reaction. The question "why did they harden so much?" often points to one of these five headings.