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Happiness — or , as academics call it — is largely a matter of the situations that you put yourself into.

, people who rank high in agreeableness put themselves into happier situations than everybody else.

It’s a part of “emotion regulation,” write authors Konrad Bresin of the University of Illinois and Michael D. Robinson of North Dakota State University.

One of , agreeableness is , or, put more negatively, it’s a measure of how much you need to be liked by the people around you.

“The more agreeable someone is, the more likely they are to be trusting, helpful and compassionate,” , while “disagreeable people are cold and suspicious of others, and they’re less likely to cooperate.”

In a series of experiments, Bresin and Robinson .

• In one experiment, participants were asked to look at a series of positive and negative images, spending as much time as they’d like with each image. Most people spent more time with the negative images — except for the agreeable folks.
• In another experiment, participants were asked if they’d like to have an experience that’s more or less positive or negative — an upbeat or a slow song, a documentary about a celebrity or about government corruption, a talk about baking cakes or dissecting a body. , “high agreeableness [participants] showed a strong preference for the positive: anthems, nation’s sweethearts, and shortbreads.”

In other words, pleasant people like pleasant things.

But problems can come with such pleasantries.

Research suggests that . Disagreeable women, , earn 5% more than their nicely behaved peers.

Similarly, Malcolm Gladwell . Prime example: IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad — he cares about selling furniture.