Understanding language processing in variable populations on their own terms: Towards a functionalist psycholinguistics of individual differences, development, and disorders.

Classic psycholinguistics seeks universal language mechanisms for all people, emphasing the "modal" listener: hearing, neurotypical, monolingual, young adults. Applied psycholinguistics then characterizes differences in terms of their deviation from modal. This mirrors naturalist philosophies of health which presume a normal function, with illness as a deviation.