It has been hypothesized that personality needs have a significant impact upon eventual occupational placement. The Edwards Personal Preference Schedule (EPPS) was designed to provide researchers in Career development with a quick and convenient measure of a number of relatively independent personality variables, or needs. It gauges 15 such needs and provides measures of test consistency and profile stability. This study was designed to observe normative differences between groups previously given the EPPS (and reported in the research literature) and to ascertain if the EPPS normative group is representative of any population. Data were collected on previous studies, encompassing 24 male and 15 female groups, which reported means and standard deviations of sub-populations. Multiple t-tests were run through computer analysis. The results suggest that the representativeness of the test manual norm group and the sensitivity of the scales are questionable and that further research on the schedule is warranted. Scale sensitivity and differentiation are considered in more detailed in part II of the paper. Autonomy, for both men and women, appears to contribute little to differentiating among groups, and hence, any time a group is found to differ from the norm on this scale, they can be said to be really different. Problems related to such use of the EPPS and which require further research are raised. (Author/PR)