How many is enough? Determining optimal sample sizes for normative studies in pediatric neuropsychology

The purpose of this investigation was to determine how confidence intervals (CIs) for pediatric neuropsychological norms vary as a function of sample size, and to determine optimal sample sizes for normative studies. First, the authors calculated 95% CIs for a set of published pediatric norms for four commonly used neuropsychological instruments. Second, 95% CIs were calculated for varying sample size (from n = 5 to n = 500). Results suggest that some pediatric norms have unacceptably wide CIs, and normative studies ought optimally to use 50 to 75 participants per cell. Smaller sample sizes may lead to over-pathologizing results, while the cost of obtaining larger samples may not be justifiable.