A model designed to account for major factors on personality questionnaires is proposed and evaluated using the Differential Personality Inventory (DPI). This model of the bases for stylistic responses to a set of personality items postulates two respondent processes: sensitivity to the underlying desirability scale values of items, and threshold for responding desirably. These processes correspond respectively to response style factors identified previously as desirability and acquiescence. A number of numerical indices of the two processes are evaluated factor analytically. When true- and false-keyed subscales of the DPI were factored the two major factors were marked respectively by measures of sensitivity and threshold. These results are similar to previous findings with the MMPI, except that for the DPI the stylistic factors accounted for only half as much variance.
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