Abstract: Response style is an important form of bias and error variance in psychological testing. But there is no study explored the characteristics of response styles in Chinese people, and to which extend they affect reliability and validity of psychological testing.
In this study, one form of NEO-FFI with 60 positive narrated items was administrated at one time to 486 middle school students. A negative form of the measure was administrated to the same student group two weeks later. In addition, a positive and negative narrative form of EPQ was also administrated to 465 middle school students in two weeks interval. Four kinds of response styles are calculated: acquiescence, extremeness, indifference and flexibility.
The several results were found.. First, response styles do exist in Chinese students. Second, Response styles that affect reliability and validity of personality tests most seriously are indifference and flexibility response styles. Extremeness response style reduces test reliability and validity, but acquiescence style does not. Third, The negative form of NEO-FFI has lower in reliability and validity than the positive form, suggesting that middle school students may have difficulties understanding negative narrated items. These results indicatethat response styles of Chinese students are different from those of western countries. Whereas indifference and flexibility are most important in Chinese students, extremeness is less important. Acquiescence as a response style does not exist

Key words: response style, acquiescence, extremeness, indifference, flexibility