The basic tenet of this paper is that the difference between black and white children on IQ measures is not due to genetics but describes the cultural distance between the two groups. The cultural distance approach is described as an amalgam of the environmental and social psychology points of view. It holds that any subculture operating according to principles not present or equally operative in the majority culture processes functional information differently from the majority culture. Therefore, minority performance on tests based upon and validated by the majority culture will show response patterns different from the norm. These patterns are indicators of what is present in the tests that is salient to each subculture and to the majority culture. The tests, however, are not responsive to what is salient to the specific minority subcultures but absent in the majority culture. Thus, bias is assumed to be present in all standardized IQ tests. Evidence from the United States and around the world shows that multicultural societies must, and for the most part do, interpret standardized IQ scores of minority individuals in a different light from those of majority individuals. (CMG)