Replicating Evidence for a Six-Factor Measurement of Sensory Processing Sensitivity with a Young Adult Population

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 replicating the structural validity of a recent sensitivity measure that has been successfully developed from and used with Dutch samples. We recruited three central US young adult samples (total n = 1,271; M age = 18.89 years; 62.2% cisgender women) and tested the structural validity of the six-dimension Sensory Processing Sensitivity Scale (SPSQ; De Gucht et al., 2022). We hypothesized that a six-factor structure of sensitivity would be better supported than more parsimonious alternatives. We hypothesized that sensitivity would be orthogonal to gender and gender socialization, and that there would be measurement invariance between women’s and men’s reports of sensitivity. We found greater support for a multidimensional measure of sensitivity over more parsimonious alternatives. We did not find support for measurement invariance between women’s and men’s reports of sensitivity, challenging assumptions about sensitivity. We speak to the value of using a multidimensional measurement of sensitivity in ongoing inquiries, while also pointing to nuances for what could be important correlated and confounds of sensitivity reports.