RIAS-2 Scores Explained: Indexes, Score Ranges, Labels and the Normative Update

The RIAS-2, the Reynolds Intellectual Assessment Scales, Second Edition, reports five index scores on the familiar IQ scale with a mean of 100 and a standard deviation of 15, and eight subtests as T scores with a mean of 50 and a standard deviation of 10. Its headline number is the Composite Intelligence Index, or CIX. The test is published by PAR, written by Cecil Reynolds and Randy Kamphaus, covers ages 3 to 94, and is given one to one by a qualified examiner. Searchers ask for RIAS-2 score ranges, score descriptors and the composite index, and this guide answers each from PAR's own documents: what the indexes are, what the labels mean, how accurate they are, and what changed with the Normative Update.

What is the RIAS-2, and what does it measure?

The RIAS-2 is a brief test of general intelligence, which psychologists write as g, plus memory and processing speed. It has eight subtests. The four that form the core are Guess What and Verbal Reasoning (verbal) and Odd-Item Out and What's Missing (nonverbal). Verbal Memory and Nonverbal Memory make up the memory index, and two new speeded subtests, the Speeded Naming Task and Speeded Picture Search, make up the speeded processing index. PAR says all eight can be completed in under an hour. Its legacy page gives 20 to 25 minutes for the intelligence subtests, 10 to 15 for memory and 5 to 10 for speed. Independent reviewers give 40 to 45 minutes in total. A two-subtest screener, the RIST-2, uses Guess What and Odd-Item Out and takes about 10 to 15 minutes.

RIAS-2 index scores: CIX, VIX, NIX, CMX and SPI

The RIAS-2 does not report a "General Intelligence Index". One shop listing calls the overall score a "General Reasoning Index", but PAR's reports use these five names:

• Verbal Intelligence Index (VIX): Guess What plus Verbal Reasoning; PAR calls it a reasonable approximation of crystallised intelligence
• Nonverbal Intelligence Index (NIX): Odd-Item Out plus What's Missing; a reasonable approximation of fluid intelligence
• Composite Intelligence Index (CIX): the VIX and NIX combined, the test's overall intelligence score
• Composite Memory Index (CMX): Verbal Memory plus Nonverbal Memory
• Speeded Processing Index (SPI): Speeded Naming Task plus Speeded Picture Search

The detail that matters most: memory and speed are not part of the CIX. A reviewer in the Journal of Pediatric Neuropsychology notes that the speeded subtests are not used in any of the intelligence indexes, which keeps motor demands and processing speed out of the overall score. That is a real difference from the WISC-V Full Scale IQ, which includes both a working-memory task and a speed task, as our guides to WISC-V index scores and full-scale IQ versus index scores explain. The DAS-II GCA makes a similar choice.

RIAS-2 score ranges and classification: what do the labels mean?

PAR attaches a descriptive label to every index score, but we could not find a public PAR document that prints the cut-offs between the labels; the table sits in the professional manual, which is not public. Here is what PAR's own sample reports show, all on the 100 and 15 scale:

• CIX 144, NIX 142 and VIX 136: "significantly above average"
• Scores of 120, 123 and 125 in the feedback report: "moderately above average"
• CMX 99: "average"
• SPI 87: "below average"

A commonly quoted scheme for the RIAS family runs from 130 and above as significantly above average down through moderately above (120 to 129), above (110 to 119), average (90 to 109), below (80 to 89) and moderately below (70 to 79) to 69 or lower as significantly below. The points above fit it, but we could not check the scheme against a PAR document for the RIAS-2, so treat the exact bands as unconfirmed, and be wary of third-party charts that use other words such as "superior": those are not PAR's labels. For the shares behind these bands on the normal curve, here is where each score falls (our approximation; PAR prints the exact percentile for the examinee):

• 70: about the 2.3rd percentile
• 85: 15.9th
• 100: 50th
• 115: 84.1st
• 120: 90.9th
• 130: 97.7th
• 145: 99.9th

PAR's sample reports agree with the curve: they print the 99.8th percentile for a CIX of 144, the 99.7th for 142, the 99th for 136, the 47th for 99 and the 19th for 87, and the normal curve gives 99.8, 99.7, 99.2, 47.3 and 19.3. You can look up any other score with our IQ percentile calculator and see the shares on the bell curve, and our IQ classifications guide compares the labels used by different tests.

How accurate is a RIAS-2 score?

PAR says internal consistency for the indexes exceeds .90 at every age group. An independent paper that read the manual's reliability tables (Farmer and Kim, 2020) reports subtest reliabilities from .80 to .99 and composite reliabilities from .86 to .97 across nine age ranges. PAR's sample reports show the result as a band: a CIX of 144 comes with a 90 per cent confidence interval of 140 to 146, and the examinee feedback report says the margin of error in each score is about 3 to 5 points. Our guide to the IQ score margin of error explains why a score is best read as a range.

Differences between indexes are less sure than the indexes themselves. Farmer and Kim found that the reliability of the RIAS-2's composite difference scores ranges from .23 to .95, and only comparisons involving the SPI reached .90. A gap between the VIX and the NIX, which is the comparison most reports lean on, is therefore weaker evidence than either number alone. PAR's interpretive report also prints how common a gap of each size was in the standardisation sample, so read that column before calling a difference unusual.

RIAS-2 Normative Update: two sets of norms

The original RIAS-2 norms come from 2,154 people aged 3 to 94 in 32 states, matched to 2012 US Census proportions, with 12 clinical groups added. PAR's Normative Update, the RIAS-2 NU, has 2,793 cases matched to 2023 Census data, with new concurrent samples using the WISC-V and WAIS-5. PAR's launch post is dated 27 February 2026 in its web address, and its page now labels the earlier version "Legacy" and recommends moving to the NU. The NU adds a Profile Validity Index (PVI), described on PAR's product page as showing how variable a person's subtest scores are compared with others of the same age, and it expands the acceptable answers on three subtests. It also requires digital scoring: PAR states that all NU administrations must be scored in PARiConnect and that hand scoring is not supported.

Norms age, so a reader who holds a RIAS-2 report should check which norms were used. A score on the 2012-census norms and a score on the 2023-census norms are not the same measuring stick, and our article on why IQ norms expire explains why a ten-year gap matters. The NU sample is about 30 per cent larger than the legacy one, 2,793 cases against 2,154.

RIAS-2 vs WISC-V: do the scores match?

PAR and its distributors say the RIAS-2 indexes were checked against the WISC-IV, WAIS-IV, WPPSI-IV and other tests with "strong to very strong" correlations, but the r values and sample sizes are in the manual and we could not read them. We also found no independent RIAS-2 study comparing its level with a Wechsler test. The only independent comparison we could read used the first RIAS: in 44 children with clinical disorders, the RIAS Composite Intelligence Index was 9.41 points higher on average than the WISC-IV Full Scale IQ, and every RIAS index was higher than its WISC-IV counterpart. That is RIAS-1 evidence in a clinical sample, so do not read it as a rule for the RIAS-2. What it does show is that two IQ tests can give one child different scores, which our guides to the Stanford-Binet 5 and Leiter-3 also explain.

Does Mensa accept the RIAS-2? Gifted programs and cut-offs

American Mensa's qualifying-score page lists one row, "Reynolds Intellectual Assessment Scales", at IQ 130, under tests given by private psychologists. It names no edition, so we cannot confirm that the RIAS-2 is accepted. Triple Nine Society's list has no RIAS row, and its only Reynolds entry is a different test, the Reynolds Adaptable Intelligence Test, at 146. PAR names school gifted and talented programs among the RIAS-2's applications, but we found no state or district rule that names the RIAS-2 with a cut-off; Ohio's list of approved assessments was blocked to our reader. Our guides to Mensa score requirements, high-IQ societies and gifted cutoff scores cover the rest.

Who can give the RIAS-2, what does it cost and can you take it online?

PAR lists the RIAS-2 and the NU at qualification level C, which means an advanced degree or licence that trains in psychological testing; one retailer lists level B. The screener, the RIST-2 NU, is level B. PAR's Normative Update kits list at $1,053 to $1,178, and legacy kits at retailers at $955 to $1,034. We found no online self-test. Every format is examiner-led, whether print, a digital record form on a tablet, or videoconference administration, and PAR's sample reports carry a notice that they are for qualified professionals only. An online quiz that uses the RIAS-2 name is not the test.

The bottom line: the RIAS-2 gives a mean-100, standard-deviation-15 Composite Intelligence Index from four reasoning subtests, a 90 per cent band of a few points either side, and descriptive labels whose exact cut-offs PAR keeps in its manual. Check which norms your report used, and treat index differences with more caution than index scores. To see your own score on the standard scale, take the IQ Metrics IQ test.

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