Summary
Mindsets, in the sense used here, are “deep, enduring patterns of thinking that underlie surface attitudes and opinions”. The definition is FrameWorks UK’s. Alongside the US-based FrameWorks Institute, it studies what it calls cultural mindsets: the shared, largely taken-for-granted assumptions people draw on to make sense of an issue. In everyday speech and in psychology ‘mindset’ often means one person’s attitude; this is a claim about culture.
FrameWorks treats mindsets as something that can be tracked over time. The Institute has done so in the US since 2020, reporting a rise in systemic thinking about racism and the economy, and FrameWorks UK’s Moving Mindsets programme is building a UK equivalent.
Rationale
Part 2 lists ‘mindsets’ among other fields’ names for this territory, and Ella Saltmarshe advises the Moving Mindsets programme. Our caveat is the word’s pull towards the head: we’d add bodies, relationships and environments.