Communal reinforcement
Communal reinforcement is a social phenomenon in which a concept or idea is repeatedly asserted very frequently in a community, that its existence is reinforced to become a strong belief in many people's minds; regardless of whether sufficient empirical evidence has been presented to support it, or more critically, its actual ground in reality. Over the years such ideas may simply be regarded as facts, and be further reinforced by publications in the mass media, books, etc. despite their lack of any significant scientific basis.
Concepts that are communally reinforced by their nature:
- Urban legends
- Myths
- Rumors (regardless of them being true or not)
- Belief systems of cults, religions, and political organizations
Other concepts seen by many to primarily originate from communal reinforcement:
- Ghosts
- UFOs
- Alien abductions
- Hypnosis
- Race (human classification to subspecies according to morphological features)
- God
- The devil
- Demons
- Angels
- Hell
- Heaven
- Infalibility of the Pope
- transubstantiation
- reincarnation
- the soul
- destiny
- kharma
- auras
- synchronicity
- out-of-body experiences
- psychic abilities
- past-life regression
- astrology and horoscopes
- communicating with the dead
- tarot cards
- witchcraft and spells
- divination
- psychic mediums
- augurs
- virgin births
- psychic surgery
- faith healing
See also: Appeal to belief, Confirmation bias , meme, groupthink