The idea for this book emerged in a singular moment. During the third year of my doctoral program in psychology, I worked as an intern for an African American agency in the inner city of Portland, Oregon, where I primarily conducted psychological evaluations. In my mind's eye, I can still see Ron, my supervisor, sitting behind his desk, legs crossed, with the top of his head peeking out above the 25-page psychological report I had just written. It had taken me weeks to write the report; I had combed over every piece of data and synthesized every important detail of this young man's life, drawing on information from a comprehensive psychological assessment battery. In my review of the results, I was careful to consider the test scores from a "cultural perspective," especially regarding the normative data for African American performance on psychometric measures.