Which statement about the norm group is true?

• A. It is the test publisher's internal sample
• B. It is the sample of test-takers used to establish norms
• C. It is the average of all possible scores
• D. It is unrelated to scoring norms

Answer: (B)

A norm group is the sample of individuals whose test results are used to create the test’s normative data. This group provides the reference distribution (mean, standard deviation, and percentiles) against which an individual’s raw score is interpreted. The purpose is to compare a person’s performance to a representative population that the test is designed to measure, so you can see where you stand relative to that group. This allows you to convert a raw score into percentile ranks or standard scores that have meaning in context.

Why this choice is the best: it directly captures that norms come from a defined group used to establish the scoring benchmarks. The publisher’s internal sample isn’t the defining idea by itself, and the norm group isn’t simply the average of all possible scores—norms come from an observed distribution of scores within a carefully chosen population. And norms are inherently tied to scoring, since they are the basis for interpreting scores.