A new study by Washington University suggests career success, like pay rises and promotions, is influenced by spouses.

Joshua Jackson, one of the researchers, said their study shows that aside from work ethic a spouse's personality matters, too.

He said the influence doesn't come from a spouse asking his wife or husband to bluntly ask for promotion.

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It's the daily experiences by the husband or wife with his or her spouse that affects the decision to ask for promotion or pay raise, he added.

To reach these findings, researchers asked their participants to take a series of psychological tests that assesed five measures of personality like openness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism and conscientiousness.

Aside from that, they also measured the personality traits of the spouse in the workplace by looking at their employment records, job satisfaction surveys, salary increases and promotion possibilities.

They found out that workers with the highest scores have spouses that are conscientious, which is true whether or not both spouses work or whether the working spouse was male or female.

Researchers found out that a conscientious partner can be relied on by his or her wife or husband to do everyday household chores like paying bills, buying groceries and raising children.

Conscientious men or women of the house tend to have good influences on their spouses since spouses tend to mimic the good personality traits of their partners like diligence and reliability in working out their workplace challenges.

Researchers also said having a spouse that keeps their significant other's life run smoothly can reduce stress and make it easier to maintain a productive work-life balance.

Researchers believe their findings bare interesting implication on choosing romantic partners. The findings showed that career oriented people would be better off choosing supportive partners with conscientious personalities.