The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos What Screen Time Is Really Doing to Your Body with Manoush Zomorodi

We hear a lot about how screens affect our mental health, but time spent on computers and smartphones is having just as much of an impact on our physical health — from brain fog and weakened core muscles to changes in our posture, our sleep, and even the shape of our eyes.

As part of our series on spring cleaning your wellbeing, Dr. Laurie sits down with journalist and podcast host Manoush Zomorodi, author of Body Electric, to explore how modern tech habits are affecting us physically, and what steps we can take to protect our health in a world where screens aren’t going away anytime soon.

Experts Mentioned:

• Manoush Zomorodi, journalist, author, and host of NPR’s TED Radio Hour
• Dr. Keith Diaz, exercise physiologist and Florence Irving Associate Professor of Behavioral Medicine at Columbia University Medical Center
• Dr. Maria Liu, Professor of Clinical Optometry at UC Berkeley and founder of the Myopia Control Clinic
• Dr. Rick Neitzel, Associate Professor of Environmental Health Sciences at the University of Michigan
• Dr. Peter Strick, Thomas Detre Professor and Chair of Neurobiology at the University of Pittsburgh
• Dr. Sahib Khalsa, psychiatrist and neuroscientist at UCLA

Resources Mentioned:

• Body Electric: The Hidden Health Costs of the Digital Age and New Science to Reclaim Your Well-Being, by Manoush Zomorodi (2026)
• Body Electric, a six-part podcast series by Manoush Zomorodi (National Public Radio, 2023)
• “Breaking Up Prolonged Sitting to Improve Cardiometabolic Risk: Dose-Response Analysis of a Randomized Crossover Trial,” by Keith M. Diaz et al. (Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 2023)
• “The Mind-Body Problem: Circuits That Link the Cerebral Cortex to the Adrenal Medulla,” by Richard P. Dum, David J. Levinthal, and Peter L. Strick (PNAS, 2019)
• Bored and Brilliant: How Spacing Out Can Unlock Your Most Productive and Creative Self, by Manoush Zomorodi (2017)

Related Episodes:

• “How I Stopped Fearing Boredom“
• “How Our Screen Habits Impact Our Stress Levels“
• “Smell, Taste and Touch: How to Joyfully Awaken Your Senses“
• “Sight and Sound: How to Joyfully Awaken Your Senses”