On the plus side, you're probably the life and soul of a party, the findings suggest.

 

Researchers analysed data from more than 13,000 university students who were involved in 12 separate studies.

 

From this, they discovered a correlation² between the 'Big Five' major personality traits and the subjects they were enrolled³ on.

 

For example, those studying law, economics, political science and medicine tended to be much more extroverted⁴ than those taking other subjects, the study found.

 

But when it came to 'agreeableness' - the tendency towards being helpful, generous and considerate - the lawyers scored particularly low, as did business and economics students.

 

Arts and humanities students, as well as those studying psychology⁵ and politics scored highly for openness, meaning they were curious, imaginative and in touch with their inner feelings.

 

While economists⁷, engineers, lawyers and scientists scored comparatively low.

 

However, the arts and humanities students also tended to be less conscientiousness⁸ and more neurotic⁹, typically exhibiting signs of anxiety and moodiness¹⁰.

 

Psychology students were not far behind arts and humanities students for these traits.

 

Study author Anna Vedel, from the University of Aarhus in Denmark, said she was surprised by the magnitude of the results.

 

'The effect sizes show that the differences found are not trivial, far from,' she said.

 

'On the more humorous side they do confirm our more or less prejudicial stereotypes¹¹ of the disturbed psychologist, the withdrawn¹² natural scientist, the cynical¹³ economist⁶.'

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