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Agreeableness: Definition, Examples, and Causes

By sihtehrani@gmail.com
March 9, 2026 11 Min Read
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Agreeableness: Definition, Examples, and Causes

Agreeableness is a personality trait consisting of the desire to get along with others and have successful relationships with them. This article explains where agreeableness comes from and what it looks like.

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I remember when the Green Day song “Nice Guys Finish Last” came out. I was pretty young, and the song was my introduction to the phrase and to the idea that people who are nice don’t get ahead in life. Instead, the thinking behind the phrase goes, nice people might let other people take opportunities and credit; they might lack the competitive edge to succeed against people who aren’t as, well, nice.

As with most things in psychology, I am naturally skeptical of blanket statements like this. But could there be some truth to the idea? Is wanting to get along with others a bad thing? Let’s look at the research on the personality trait called agreeableness to see where “being nice” comes from, what it looks like, and whether being nice means you’re going to finish last after all.​

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What Is Agreeableness? (A Definition)

Agreeableness is a personality trait, something that each person has to some degree. Agreeableness reflects our ability to and interest in getting along with other people – it is how much we want to work well with others, want to meet common goals, and want to have positive relationships (Costa et al., 1991).
 
There are several key domains, or facets, to the trait of agreeableness (Costa et al., 1991):
 

  • Trust. People high in agreeableness are very trusting of others – they expect that other people are telling the truth and have good intentions. People low in agreeableness are more cynical; they naturally expect other people to be threatening and to be lying.
  • Straightforwardness. On the other side of the trust equation, people high in agreeableness are also generally straightforward with other people. They are honest and direct in relating to other people. Being low in agreeableness is associated with concealing one’s motives and generally being dishonest.
  • Altruism. Altruism means showing concern for others and putting their needs first. In agreeableness, this means having a strong orientation toward the social good and being selfless. People high in agreeableness are considerate of others and will often inconvenience themselves a bit to make sure other people are taken care of. Altruism often looks like generosity – think of Scrooge from A Christmas Carol after his overnight transformation into a man of charity.
  • Compliance. Compliant means going along with requests and deferring to other people. People high in agreeableness are very likely to defer to the needs or expectations of other people, while people low in agreeableness will probably strongly resist any demands that are made of them.
  • Modesty. People high in agreeableness tend to have more humility. They are not likely to make a conversation about themselves or to have an unrealistically high opinion of themselves. By contrast, people low in agreeableness are more likely to have big egos.
  • Tender-Mindedness. People high in agreeableness tend to listen to their feelings and let their feelings influence their behaviors. This may be why they are more likely to have empathy for other people.

Opposite of Agreeableness

The opposite of being agreeable is often said to be being antagonistic (Thalmayer & Rossier, 2019). To be antagonistic means seeing other people as opponents or foes, not as potential friends or allies. If we think about the different facets of agreeableness, we can see how most people would treat their enemies in ways that do not seem very agreeable. Indeed, people low in agreeableness show little compassion, trust, or friendliness to other people (Crowe et al., 2018) – just the way you might be tempted to behave when your colleague (who is vying for the same promotion as you) starts bragging about their achievements to your mutual supervisor

Why Is Agreeableness Important?

Agreeableness is important because it is a huge factor in determining how successful we are at forming and maintaining social relationships throughout our lives (Jensen-Campbell et al., 2003). Studies from childhood through adulthood show that people high in agreeableness have an easier time resolving conflicts, coping with relationship challenges, and adjusting to other’s needs (Jensen-Campbell et al., 2003; Wilmot & Ones, 2022). Indeed, levels of agreeableness may be the most important of the primary personality traits in determining the social outcomes in our lives (Jensen-Campbell et al., 2003).
 
I can really relate to these are research findings. I have always known myself to be a very agreeable person – often to a point that can be unhealthy. But I recognize that, even when other personality traits, such as experiencing lots of negative emotions or being more introverted, have made it hard for me to be as social as I would like, my desire to have harmonious relationships has allowed me to pretty easily maintain the relationships I already have and establish new ones when I have the urge to do so.

Benefits of Agreeableness

We have already established that one benefit of agreeableness is that it is a personality trait that facilitates social connections. But there are many other upsides to being high in agreeableness. Agreeableness is negatively associated with strong, angry reactions, meaning people high in agreeableness are less likely to lash out at other people or get into conflicts (Martin et al., 2000). People high in agreeableness rarely are alone, because they are generally pleasant to be around and show interest in others (Wilmot & Ones, 2022). In fact, they often experience more positive emotions and have overall better psychological health than people lower in agreeableness (DeNeve & Cooper, 1998).

Agreeableness & Social Connection

At the same time, being a very agreeable person does not generally mean that one will be more satisfied with life overall (Anderson & Cowan, 2014). Why might this be? It seems that while high agreeableness means lots of social connection, it doesn’t necessarily translate into healthy or good social connection. For example, people high in agreeableness may engage in behaviors that go against their own values or are harmful to themselves because they want to get along with others.
 
This leads us to an important point: too much of any trait is likely to result in some challenges as well as some benefits. People high in agreeableness may avoid raising topics that need to be discussed, work themselves to the bone for the approval of others, neglect their own needs, and get burned when they put their trust in people who did not deserve that trust and will take advantage of them.
 
For a thought-provoking take on some of the benefits of being low in agreeableness, I recommend watching this video:

Video: The Advantages of Being Disagreeable (Low on Agreeableness)

Causes of Agreeableness

What determines how agreeable a person is? Research tells us that some of our agreeableness is heritable, but the biggest cause of our agreeableness is the experiences we have in our lives, and how they shape our attitudes and expectations (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2014; Vukasovic & Bratko, 2015). Simply put, both our genes and our lived experiences shape our drive to build positive relationships with others (Wilmot & Ones, 2022).
 
What might this look like in practice? Imagine a child born to two parents whom all their friends agree are “very nice” people. This child might be born with traits that predispose them to being agreeable. Then, they grow up in an environment that features two very agreeable parents. Their parents are warm and caring, almost always showing an interest in the child and often giving the child opportunities to enjoy themselves and grow. The child comes to expect that relating well to others and having meaningful relationships is a pleasant and rewarding activity, so they practice it. Over time, they come to focus on the positives in relationships, don’t get stuck on the negatives, and continue to reinforce their own agreeable nature by having high quality friendships through childhood and adulthood (Bresin & Robinson, 2015).

Agreeableness in Psychology

To give you a sense of how agreeableness has been studied in psychology, I am going to tell you just a little bit about a recent study in which the two authors tried to summarize all the summaries of research on agreeableness (Wilmot & Ones, 2022). It was no small task, as there were already 142 summaries (called meta-analyses) that had reviewed almost 4000 studies!
 
These authors showed in their review that agreeableness is associated with outcomes that are almost exclusively positive in nature. To be more specific, they found that people high in agreeableness are more socially integrated and oriented toward others, work harder (especially in teams), invest more in relationships, experience more contentment, and have more experiences of self-transcendence (in other words, feeling connected to cause or entity greater than themselves). Not a bad list of outcomes, huh? 

Examples of Agreeableness

Here are a few examples of agreeableness that I’ve witnessed in my own life this week. First, there is my housemate who likes to sit on the porch and always gets up to open the door for me when I arrive home carrying groceries. Second, there is the friend of mine who called up their friends in another city to see if they would host me on an upcoming trip. Third, I listened to a speech from the Oscars in which the award winner spent the whole time thanking others for their support, leaving themselves no time for self-congratulation. Finally, I think of how I immediately said yes when a housemate asked to borrow my bike while I’m out of town. I instinctively trusted this housemate and wanted to be helpful to them.

Agreeableness Vs. Antagonism

As we noted above, the opposite of agreeableness is antagonism, and we can think of people as being on a spectrum from very agreeable to very antagonistic. It turns out that this personality trait spectrum, although originally conceived of by researchers in the U.S., seems to be present in many other cultures as well (Thalmayer & Rossier, 2019). In fact, very similar personality disorders and other psychiatric disorders, all of which are defined in part by low agreeableness, are found across these cultures, too.
 
Interestingly, it looks like rates of antagonism are higher, and agreeableness is lower, in some industrialized countries compared to less industrialized countries (Thalmayer & Rossier, 2019). I am inclined to interpret this as being related to the influence of capitalism and the diminishment of social connections in these cultures (Putnam, 2000): I hypothesize that as people become more focused on their own financial gain and less connected to their neighbors, they become less agreeable.

​Agreeableness and Leadership

​Do highly agreeable people make better leaders? This is a tricky question. From correlational research, it seems that being agreeable is not a very good predictor of being a good leader (Judge et al., 2002). This may be because people who are very agreeable can struggle to hold other people accountable or because we associate agreeableness in leaders with being “soft” (Blake et al., 2022). However, recent research suggests that leaders who embrace their agreeableness are becoming more valued by the people who follow them (Blake et al., 2022), so there is the possibility that agreeableness is becoming more valued as a leadership trait.

​Agreeableness and Conscientiousness

It does not appear that agreeableness and conscientiousness are related traits – people who are high in one trait are not more likely to be high in the other (Witt et al., 2022). However, people who are high in both traits may be especially effective in professional spaces (Witt et al., 2022).

​How to Improve Agreeableness

​It is not easy to make substantial changes to our personalities, but here are a couple suggestions for how to make yourself more agreeable. First, you can seek out new experiences, such as meeting new people, especially those who may be different from you, as this kind of contact with others may increase our agreeableness (Vezzali et al., 2018). Second, you can practice showing compassion to others, trusting them, and being respectful of them. These are deliberate behaviors that people trying to increase their agreeableness often try (Baranski et al., 2021), and if you find the experiences positive or enjoyable, it may become easier to act agreeably in the future.

Articles Related to Agreeableness

​Want to learn more? Check out these articles:

Books Related to Agreeableness​

If you’d like to keep learning more, here are a few books that you might be interested in.​

Final Thoughts on Agreeableness

Agreeableness is the personality trait that drives good social connections. I encourage you to practice taking agreeable actions, whether or not you see yourself as an agreeable person. You and the people around you are likely to benefit.

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