Doing Science With Our Grandmother's WISDOM: A Worldview Integrating Sociality, Diversity, and Observant Meaning-Making

The contemporary moment is defined and marred by geopolitical sorrow-with genocide in Gaza, and wars in Sudan and Ukraine to mention some-devastating the lives of millions of people. The resulting geopolitical, ecological, communal, and personal devastation will last for generations in concrete and substantive ways, as the legacy of war and genocide stays with those who survive. In this perspective, we highlight an example of this by discussing new lines of evidence for intergenerational epigenetic transmission of sustained, war-related trauma. Here we articulate a novel frame labeled WISDOM: a Worldview Integrating Sociality, Diversity, and Observant Meaning-making. This framing aims to facilitate rigorous science in the relatively uncharted domains of biocultural approaches to intergenerational trauma, survival, and resilience. WISDOM is a perspective with practical components, focused primarily on trauma but applicable to other foci at the confluence of biological and social sciences.