Basically what you mentioned does not have anything to do with the act of “observation” affecting the choice of what the electron wants to do, right? No hocus-pocus “electron intelligence”...
Just that the electrons produce interference patterns through a double slit, whether they are fired en-masse or one by one, and they produce a single pattern, when fired through a single slit.
Did I infer the above correctly?
In the double-slit case, we see a wave-like pattern on the screen, as if the electron beams are like two ocean waves flowing through both slits and interfering with each other.
What if we try to observe the electrons as they pass through the slits? Will we see waves passing through, or particles?
If we do that, the wave pattern collapses, and the electrons act like particles.
So in this case, when we try to observe the electron acting like a wave directly, it doesn't display the wave-like property. So arguably, this variation brings in the consideration you raised as to the act of observation interfering with the sub-atomic particle.
Very mysterious.