Doesn't this sound like the best place to work? Carleton University's psychology department has something they call their "Happiness Laboratory," and today they've linked to this video of professor John Zelenski explaining what sort of research—we imagine it involves puppies and candy canes and Community episode marathons—goes on there.

Okay, so maybe it's not quite what we'd expected. But still, some pretty fascinating stuff, especially Zelenski's research into the traits of introversion and extroversion. As he says:

My lab has been interested in the trait of extroversion for a long time, and in particular because it's such a good predictor of happiness. Introverts never like to hear this, but there's a ton of research to suggest that extroverts are happier—at least, they tell us they're happier than the introverts do, on average

That's just the starting point: Zelnenski says it's been shown that when introverts come out of their shell and act like extroverts, they actually report higher levels of happiness. And they're looking into why, if that's true, introverts don't do it more often.

Check out the video above to see some of the theories they've come up with, and what sort of research the Happy Lab has planned—on that topic, and on others—in the future.

Photo by quinn.anya on Flickr