David Ronder Jul 28, 2009:

No rule: a grey area I would just point out that there is no fixed grammatical rule here: it is perfectly legitimate to hyphenate a compound noun like this and usage varies greatly. It is largely a matter of style. In general, American English tends to hyphenate compounds more than British and also to make compounds into a single noun (ballpark etc). For the record, I prefer age group without a hyphen but think age range (also without a hyphen) is the best answer to this question. ¡Saludos!

Ramón Ruiz López Jul 28, 2009:

No harm done I'm taking no offence at all. In fact, I agree with you: I prefer the option without a dash and maybe I rushed when I chose to write it that way in my answer. In any case, as you surely know, Google has never been good at performing Boolean searches when it comes to dashes, not even if you use quotes. I guess my point was your comment felt slightly tactless, but I may have been too touchy here so I'll spare you the harangue on tactfulness. ¡Saludos y gracias!

jmleger Jul 28, 2009:

Don't take my word for it just google age group and see what happens. I really don't have a dog in this fight. I don't care how you choose to write that. I am just telling you what I think the grammatical rule is. Take it or leave it. It's all the same to me.

Ramón Ruiz López Jul 27, 2009:

Something I dislike about our profession — I include myself — is our strong tendency to nitpick and underestimate our colleagues' knowledge. I am perfectly aware that a dash is used for adjectives consisting of more than one word. I'm just wondering — how (and what's more, why) could you think otherwise? La duda ofende, en serio. Yet I found it is a question of style to use the dash here. Yes, as a noun. Not one of grammar. It goes without saying that I'll stand corrected if a native speaker tells me I'm deeply wrong and they never use it with a dash, but I did my homework and looked it up before answering:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/age-group
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/age group

Saludos.

jmleger Jul 27, 2009:

age group this book is for the 9 to 12 age group
this book is age-group appropriate

It's not a question of style, but one of grammar.