Researchers of a new study found that a person's sleeping position reveals a lot about his or her relationship.

University of Hertfordshire psychologists carried out one of the first studies that looked into what a person's preferred sleeping position say about his or her relationship. The study was carried out at the Edinburgh International Science Festival where 1000 people were asked to describe their preferred sleeping position and to rate their personality and quality of their relationship.

The most common sleeping postion found among the couples was by facing their backs to each other with 42 percent of the participants preferring this position. Another 31 percent reported sleeping in the same direction as their partner. Only 4 percent said they slept facing their partner. Researchers also found that 12 percent of couples slept less than an inch apart from their partner while 2 percent slept more than 20 inches away from their partner.

Researchers found that "touching" played a very important role in determining the quality of a romantic relationship. They noted than 94 percent of couples who slept by touching each other were happy in their relationship compared to 68 percent of those that didn't touch.

Distance also mattered. Researchers found that 86 percent of couples who slept less than one inch apart from each other were happy in their relationship compared to 66 percent of those who slept more than 30 inches apart.

"This is the first survey to examine couples' sleeping positions, and the results allow people to gain an insight into someone's personality and relationship by simply asking them about their favourite sleeping position," University of Hertfordshire psychologist Professor Richard Wiseman said in a press statement.

Wiseman and his team also found that extroverts are more likely to spend the night close to their partners, and more creative types tend to sleep on their left hand side.