Optimizing methods of combining discrepant diagnostic information from multiple sources is one of the more daunting tasks facing the field of child psychopathology. Several researchers have asserted that complex information-combining schemes, those in which certain information or sources of information are weighted differently from others, are preferable. This study provides theoretical and empirical evidence that simple information-combining schemes, those in which all information from all sources is weighted equally, will as a rule work as well as complex schemes and may even work better. The implications of these findings for diagnostic instrument and algorithm design are discussed. A two-step diagnostic procedure utilizing a simple information-combining scheme is presented.