Some people don’t just notice a loud room. They feel it, in their chest, their thoughts, their energy levels for hours afterward. There’s a name for this, and it’s more common than most people realise.

Sensory Processing Sensitivity, or SPS, is a well-documented personality trait affecting an estimated 15–20% of the population. It’s not a disorder, a diagnosis, or a flaw. It’s a genuine neurological difference in how deeply the brain processes environmental and social stimuli and understanding it changes how we should think about event and workplace design.

What the Research Actually Shows

SPS was first identified and measured through the Highly Sensitive Person Scale, developed in landmark research published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The research identified a distinct, measurable trait, separate from introversion or emotionality, describing people who process sensory and social information more deeply than average.

Neuroimaging research has taken this further. Studies using fMRI have found that people with high SPS show distinct patterns of brain activity in regions associated with awareness, empathy, and sensory integration, including the insular cortex, an area linked to interoception and emotional processing. This isn’t a subjective preference. It’s a measurable difference in how the brain handles incoming information.

More recent research, including a 2025 experience sampling study, has directly linked sensory processing sensitivity to overstimulation in daily life, finding that highly sensitive individuals report significantly higher rates of feeling overwhelmed by ordinary environmental demands than the general population.

The Overlap with Neurodivergence

Research has also found a significant positive correlation between sensory processing sensitivity and ADHD traits in the general population, suggesting that sensory sensitivity and neurodivergence often travel together, and that the population affected by high-stimulation environments is broader than a single diagnostic category can capture.

What This Means for Event and Workplace Design

If 15–20% of any audience or workforce processes stimulation more intensely than average, that’s not a fringe consideration, it’s a substantial portion of the room. And the interesting finding across SPS research is that these individuals also tend to score higher on measures of creativity and empathy, meaning the same trait that makes bright lights and loud rooms exhausting also correlates with some of the qualities organisations most want in their people.

Designing for sensory sensitivity isn’t designing for a minority. It’s designing for a well-documented, substantial, and often high-performing part of your population.

How Calm Nest Collective® Applies This

At Calm Nest Collective®, our Calm Nest Spaces® are built on the understanding that sensory processing varies significantly across any group of people and that genuinely inclusive design accounts for that variation as standard, not as an accommodation.

Because the question is no longer should we have a quiet room? It’s how do we build one that genuinely works?

Design for the full spectrum of sensory experience. [Talk to Calm Nest Collective →]