Laurie Santos

Laurie Santos is the Chandrika and Ranjan Tandon Professor of Psychology and Head of Silliman College at Yale University. She directs the Comparative Cognition Laboratory and the Canine Cognition Center. Santos received her A.B. in Psychology and Biology from Harvard University in 1997, graduating magna cum laude with highest distinction and earning the Certificate in Mind, Brain, and Behavior. She obtained her A.M. in Psychology in 2001 and Ph.D. in Psychology (Cognition, Brain, and Behavior) from Harvard in 2003, where her dissertation won the Richard J. Herrnstein Dissertation Prize. She joined the Yale Department of Psychology as Assistant Professor in 2003, advanced to Associate Professor (on term) in 2007, and to tenured Associate Professor in 2010.

Santos's research explores the evolutionary origins of human cognition, focusing on core knowledge of physical and social cognition in human infants, nonhuman primates, and dogs, including primate theory of mind, object knowledge, and tool use. Her work has been published in leading journals, with over 14,500 citations on Google Scholar. Key publications include the book The Origins of Object Knowledge (Oxford University Press, 2009, co-authored with B.M. Hood); "Rhesus Monkeys Attribute Perceptions to Others" (Current Biology, 2005); "Core Knowledges: A Dissociation Between Spatiotemporal Knowledge and Contact-Mechanics in a Non-Human Primate" (Developmental Science, 2004); and "Object Individuation for Good and Bad in Rhesus Macaques (Macaca mulatta)" (Cognition, 2002). She has received major awards such as the American Psychological Association's Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contribution to Psychology (2012), Lex Hixon Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Social Sciences (2011), Popular Science Magazine's Brilliant 10 (2007), Arthur Greer Memorial Prize for Outstanding Junior Faculty (2008), and Stanton Prize from the Society for Philosophy and Psychology (2008). In Psychology, Santos developed "Psychology and the Good Life," Yale's most popular course in over 300 years, enrolling nearly one in four undergraduates; its Coursera version, The Science of Well-Being, has over 4.5 million enrollments. She has served on Yale's Committee for Marshall, Mitchell, and Rhodes Scholarships and was President-Elect of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology (2014).

Professional Email: laurie.santos@yale.edu