Following service in the American air force, Laughlin completed his undergraduate work in anthropology with a concentration in philosophy at San Francisco State University.
His doctoral dissertation was based on fieldwork conducted among a small tribe in northeast Uganda called the So (aka Tepeth, Tepes; see Laughlin and Allgeier 1979).
Laughlin completed his dissertation, Economics and Social Organization among the So of Northeastern Uganda, and received his Ph.D. in 1972 while he was assistant professor of anthropology at the State University of New York at Oswego.
While teaching at Oswego, Laughlin pursued his interest in the neurobiological bases of human sociality, which led to his developing, in collaboration with Eugene G. d'Aquili of the University of Pennsylvania, the theory of biogenetic structuralism—a perspective that sought to merge the structuralism of Claude Lévi-Strauss with neuroscience.
His interest in this field stemmed from his own personal experiences after being exposed to meditation in various disciplines and years as a monk within the Sakya tradition of Tibetan Buddhism.