Research questions:The purpose of the study was to reveal new aspects of interpreters' memory and executive control. Design: The memory and executive control of simultaneous and consecutive interpreters were compared to those of foreign language teachers and non-linguistic experts in two experiments: free recall and cocktail-party dichotic listening. Data: Volunteers were 94 participants (22 to 26 participants in each group) with a minimum of 10 years of professional experience. Findings: Simultaneous interpreters outperformed the non-linguistic experts in free recall. Though most of them detected their name in the cocktail-party test, they made no errors in the first and second word after it. In contrast, consecutive interpreters exceeded the performance of non-linguistic experts in seldom detecting their name in the cocktail-party test, as well as in making just a few errors in the first word after it. The results seem to indicate expertisedependent differences between the two interpreter groups, as well as between foreign language teachers and non-linguistic experts. For simultaneous interpreters, the findings can be explained by conditions at work which demand the continuous dividing of attention between listening to the source text, formulating and speaking the target text, and even monitoring and comparing the equivalence of the two. With consecutive interpreters, the results could reflect high demands for resisting external distractions at work. Originality: The results seem to point to expertise-dependent differences in memory and executive control between different foreign language expert groups achieved as a result of thorough experience in their field of expertise.
Research Questions: The purpose of the present experiment was to study interpreters’ recall of spoken prose. Design: The prose recall of simultaneous and consecutive interpreters was compared to that of foreign language teachers and non-linguistic experts. The professional experience of participants (21–24 participants in each group) was 10 years as a aminimum. The auditory presentation of the prose passage to be recalled, divided into eleven speech sequences, resembled the working conditions of interpreters. Data: Transcripted prose recall recordings were analysed quantitatively through an idea unit measure and qualitatively through meaning-based expressions. Findings: The foreign language expert groups outperformed the non-linguistic experts in both quantitative and qualitative measures. Additionally, compared to foreign language teachers, interpreters indicated a better recall of time expressions and topic sentences, as well as of complicated emotional and causal expressions. The explanation for these findings could indicate expertise-dependent tendencies: possibly a continuous practising of careful listening and the demand for a quick comprehension of the source text under the extreme time pressure of interpreters’ work leads to better results in prose recall. However, the findings can only be generalized to a limited extent because the prose passage used contained only one or two expressions of each type studied in the qualitative analysis. Originality: The study differs from previous studies in that the memory of interpreters, and especially of consecutive interpreters, was studied for the first time with a prose recall measure. Significance: The prose recall test revealed that the abilities of careful listening and effective comprehension of coherence and causality seem to play a significant role in explaining memory functions of simultaneous and consecutive interpreters compared to those of foreign language teachers and non-linguistic experts.
Aims and Objectives: The aim of the present study was to investigate whether particular temperament and personality traits are more characteristic to interpreters’ expert performance than to expert performance in other fields. Design: To these ends, the Temperament and Character Inventory by Cloninger et al. (1994) and the distractibility scale of the Revised Dimensions of Temperament Survey by Windle (1992) were used. Data and Analyses: The data was gathered from two groups of interpreters (simultaneous and consecutive) and was compared to one group of foreign language teachers and one of non-linguistic experts from different fields of society. The group size varied between 20 and 23 participants each. The analyses were carried out with multivariate analysis of variance, supplemented with Bonferroni corrected contrasts. Findings: The results seem to indicate that temperament and character traits may have different impacts on different expert groups. In this study, in comparison to the control groups of foreign language teachers and non-linguistic experts, high cooperativeness was found to be more characteristic to simultaneous and consecutive interpreters. Cooperativeness also appears to be valued by recruiters and trainers of interpreters, for instance. Originality: The study was the first one comparing interpreters’ temperament and character dimensions with those of other expert groups, such as foreign language teachers and non-linguistic experts. Significance and Limitations: Among the different temperament and personality traits, at least cooperativeness seems to have a connection to the abilities and skills needed in the profession of an interpreter. More research, however, is needed to reveal possible connections of various temperament and personality traits with expertise in different fields. In this particular case, additional studies could show whether individuals with high cooperativeness become more easily interested in such professions as interpreting, or whether the high cooperativeness is a result of more experience and expertise in interpreting.
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