animism

n. 1. A usually derogatory term for a large number of belief systems in which things such as trees, mountains, rivers, or animals are considered to have spiritual aspects which are not considered to have any spiritual character from the Judeo-Christian-Islamic point of view traditional in Euro-American cultures. 2. In anthropology, some anthropologists believe it is a religious point of view involving a large number of spiritual beings which is an outgrowth of earlier forms of religion in which there is a general spiritual essence which is the same in all things. 3. In Piagetian theory, a form of preoperational thought in which inanimate objects are thought of as having humanlike characteristics.