Her research focuses on normal and impaired language across the lifespan. This research program is interdisciplinary and uses insights and methodologies from linguistics, psycholinguistics and neuropsychology to examine how language is learned, represented and processed in children and adults, and how it is impaired in persons with brain damage and cognitive decline. Models of normal language representation and processing are used to understand impaired language function. In turn, processing constraints and observed patterns of breakdown help select amongst competing theories of linguistic representation. Clinical rehabilitation protocols that support generalization across contexts are informed by acquisition and generalization in normal language.