Ordinary people readily attribute mental states to groups perceived as mind-like

Evidence

The notion that a group may have a mental state has long been rejected in social psychology as a nonscientific fallacy (Allport, 1924). Indeed, researchers would typically face difficulty in providing an operational definition of group mind. However, the findings by Teramae and Karasawa (2008) demonstrate that behavior explanations constructed by ordinary people can easily presuppose intentions associated with beliefs and desires even in a group, as long as the group is perceived to possess a mind-like function. — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 154

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies what ‘group mind’ means operationally: laypeople’s willingness to presuppose beliefs and desires in a group.
• SEED: Angle: organizational blame — citizens routinely treat corporations and agencies as having intentions, a folk jurisprudence hidden in everyday reasoning about scandals.