Evidence of Convergent and Discriminant Validity between Sensory Processing Sensitivity and Other Individual Difference Measures

Sensory processing sensitivity (sensitivity) involves the ways people differ in being attentive and responsive to bodily, social, and environmental cues. We aimed to build evidence that sensitivity is complementary to other individual differences and measures of personality, yet is not redundant with measures of temperament, traits, character, and narrative identity. We recruited 774 young adults from the central U.S. (M age = 18.9 years; 60.9% women) and tested relations between sensitivity and other self-reports and narrative expressions of personality. Each dimension of sensitivity was significantly correlated with other measures of personality. These correlations were not so large as to suggest redundancy between measures. Further, sensitivity to emotional and physiological stimuli was related to the ways people changed expressions of narrative processing between the construction of positive-valence and negative-valence life stories. We discuss how findings reinforce theories about sensory processing sensitivity and personality, as well as the value of considering sensitivity as distinct yet complementary to other longstanding measures of personality.