In psychology and psychiatry, it really means “average” or “typical,” but we too easily think of it as a synonym for “how everyone is supposed to think and feel”.
Autism, schizophrenia, depression and panic, have been around since ancient times and will be around for thousands of years, if the subtle genetic variants that influence those conditions have some evolutionary use. People who live at the psychological margins of society challenge the privileged position of social norms and expose the reality of accidental qualities of human nature. Insofar as this is true, psychiatric disorders are not deviations from humanity as much as definitions of it.
— Read on blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/what-is-normal-anyway/
