Group polarization

Group Polarization
Depending on the overall culture of the group, a group may behave more riskily or more cautiously than is necessary.

If the group is composed of many individuals who are risk-takers, often the group will be polarized to behave very riskily. The same goes for a group that has many members who are highly cautious: this group will be polarized to behave overly cautiously.

Factors that contribute and create group polarization:
 * Greater number of arguments and their level of persuasion each member is exposed to influences their attitudes to become more polarized (if the group favours risky decisions, the more people argue for risky behaviour, the more people will have a strong belief in taking risks within the group).
 * People finding more support for their own opinion than they had anticipated could cause an extreme norm to take place that is overly emphasized by the members.
 * The desire of the group members to distinguish themselves from other groups by behaving more extremely than they need to be.