The research in this article attempted to relate content features of personality items to item parameter estimates from Muraki’s partial credit model. Goldberg’s Adjective Checklist was administered to 329 participants to calibrate item parameters. These parameters were then related to item ratings of social desirability, item subtlety, frequency of misunderstanding, and word usage frequency indexes. Subtle items tended to have lower discrimination parameter estimates. There was also an interaction between subtlety and social desirability such that items low in subtlety and high in social desirability had lower location parameters. Implications for future psychometric research in the personality domain are discussed.
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