[2] She has been a featured TED speaker[3] and has been listed in Popular Science as one of their "Brilliant Ten" young scientists in 2007[4] as well as in Time magazine as a "Leading Campus Celebrity" in 2013.

[6][7] In September 2019, she became host of the popular podcast The Happiness Lab, published by Pushkin Industries — the media company led by journalists Malcolm Gladwell and Jacob Weisberg.

Her father, whose family is of Cape Verdean descent, was a programmer and her mother, who is from the United States, was a guidance counselor at New Bedford High School, where Santos and her brother Aaron attended.

She has been featured on National Public Radio,[14][15] on Big Think, and—with her colleagues Paul Bloom, Tamar Gendler and Joshua Knobe she is a regular contributor to Bloggingheads.tv’s Mind Report.

[20] The podcast published by Pushkin Industries,[8] the media company led by journalists Malcolm Gladwell and Jacob Weisberg, formerly of Slate magazine.

Writing in the Financial Times, Fiona Sturges wrote: “Santos is the voice of sanity, not to mention scrupulous research.

[She's] a warm yet authoritative host who shows us the contradictions in our psychological impulses.”[21] As of October 2023, it has a 4.9-star rating on Spotify, with approximately 130 episodes to date.

Yale professor Dr. Laurie Santos has studied the science of happiness and found that many of us do the exact opposite of what will truly make our lives better.

Based on the psychology course she teaches at Yale -- the most popular class in the university’s 300-year history -- Laurie will take you through the latest scientific research and share some surprising and inspiring stories that will change the way you think about happiness."