Abstract
Environmental Sensitivity refers to the ability to register and process external stimuli (Pluess, 2015). This ability makes it possible for an organism to perceive, evaluate, and respond to various environmental conditions and is critical for the adaptation to both adverse and beneficial aspects of the developmental context. A growing number of empirical studies have shown that people differ in their general environmental sensitivity. However, what hasn’t been taken into consideration yet is whether people differ not only in the degree of sensitivity but also regarding what they are sensitive to, especially given that around 30% of people are highly sensitive. More specifically, some individuals could be especially susceptible to just adversity, some to just beneficial factors, some to both, and some to neither. Supported by existing theories and empirical studies, we categorized individuals into different sensitivity types based on a new sensitivity measure (HSP-18) and then validated the categorization by examining the personality and well-being profile of different sensitivity types across two independent samples (N1=1000, N2=600). Result support the existence of sensitivity types and deepen our understanding of environmental sensitivity.