CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION
6.1 Conclusion
Simultaneous interpreters encounter numbers in various types of speeches. It is, therefore, important for interpreters to handle numbers well (Jones, 1998; Xu, 1999).
However, numbers has been identified as one of the hurdles in simultaneous interpreting (Gile, 1995; 1997; 1999; Lederer, 1978/2002). To explore possible factors underlying the perceived difficulty associated with numbers, this study reviewed relevant research findings in psycholinguistics, cognitive science and identified the characteristics of numbers that might influence the interpreting process.
The study then focused on isolating and examining the effects of numbers in an experiment setting. The experiment involved 12 participants—4 practicing interpreters and 8 student interpreters. The participants were assigned into two groups and each group interpreted one of the two versions of the speech material.
The two versions were identical except for 20 critical sentences: while one critical sentence in one version contained a number or numbers (Number-Sentence), its corresponding critical sentence in the other version was free of numbers but
otherwise similar in meaning (Control-Sentence). The interpretations of Number-Sentences were then compared with their corresponding Control-Sentences to see if the presence of numbers affected the accuracy and fluency of the interpretations. In this study, accuracy was measured through propositional analysis—calculating the percentage of propositions correctly interpreted, while fluency was measured by the number of hesitation phenomena in the interpretation.
The results showed that not all numbers were associated with lower accuracy in simultaneous interpreting. It was numbers requiring number word syntax conversion that had a more observable impact on accuracy. In terms of number’s effect on fluency, this study found that numbers requiring syntax conversion and numbers appearing in proximity in the speech increased the number of hesitation phenomena in the interpretation. Together, these findings suggest that number word syntax conversion poses a heavier processing requirement in SI. The findings also suggest that when numbers appear in proximity, the processing requirement increases as well.
The greater processing requirement of numbers can lead to omissions or errors in the speech segment containing numbers, or trigger a failure sequence (Gile, 1995, 1997, 1999), hindering the successful processing of the next speech segment. These
The retrospective data from this study also suggest that individual differences play an important role in determining the extent to which numbers affect the interpreting performance. In particular, aversion or inattention to numbers in general can have an adverse effect on the performance of number interpreting.
6.2 Limitations of the Study 6.2.1 General Limitations
The small number of participants was the foremost limitation of this study. It was possibly due to this small sample size that the effect of numbers on fluency did not reach statistical significance. Furthermore, regarding the effects of numbers on accuracy, the findings were confounded by the difference between the two groups of participants who interpreted different versions of the speech material. Therefore, the findings of this study are not supposed to be generalized across different experimental procedures. In addition, the participants in this study were mostly student interpreters, with the exceptions of 4 practicing interpreters with 2-3 years of working experience. The findings, as a result, are more likely to apply to student interpreters and cannot be generalized across interpreters with different degrees of expertise.
6.2.2 Issue of Ecological Validity
Despite the effort to simulate a real conference setting, the experimental design of the study meant that some elements of a real conference were missing or compromised. The speech material was prerecorded, rather than delivered impromptu. Neither the speaker nor the audience was present. However, the majority of the participants did not mention that the experiment setting influenced their interpreting performance. This is probably because they were used to the classroom training setting, where they were presented with the audio only, with the instructor as the sole listener (Liu, 2001).
Also, one participant mentioned that he had been expecting to hear Clinton’s voice and was a bit distracted in the beginning of the interpreting task when he found the speech was read by someone else. Similar issues were also reported in another study using speeches originally delivered by famous people but read by someone else for experiment purposes (Chang, 2005). To avoid this problem, future studies may consider avoiding the use of this type of material, or, if the content of the speech allows, set a different identity for the speaker.
6.2.3 Manipulation of Speech Material
In an attempt to isolate and examine the effect of exact numbers,
such as “a multitude of”, “dozens of”, “hundreds of thousands of”. However, it is possible that in some cases the replacements might have required additional processing capacity in SI from English into Mandarin for various reasons. In the case of the phrase “a multitude of,” although the word “multitude” is among the 4,000 most common words in English (Thorndike, 1975), its relatively low frequency might have led to longer processing time. In addition, some replacements might have also contributed to greater processing requirement due to the lack of ready translation candidates in Mandarin. Finally, the retrospective data indicated that some participants strived to be very specific in rendering these indefinite expressions: for instance, interpreting “hundreds of thousands of” as “ 好 幾 十 萬 (several 100 thousands)” instead of using the more common and general expression “成千上萬,”
which may be easier to retrieve. For the foregoing reasons, it is possible that some Control-Sentences could be as difficult as or even more difficult than their corresponding Number-Sentences, particularly if the numbers in Number-Sentences did not require number syntax conversion. This might have contributed to the lack of significant effects of numbers in the study.
6.3 Implications for Training
The findings of this study suggest that number word syntax conversion is a major obstacle in number interpreting from English into Mandarin. These findings lend support to writings in the literature that urge student interpreters to practice number-conversion skills vigorously (Bao, 1998; Chang, 1999; Her, 1995; Huang, 2005; Liu, 1993; Mei, 2000). If the number conversion task is automated to a greater degree, then it can be performed with higher accuracy and less processing capacity like any highly automated task (Sternberg, 2003; pp. 71-73), freeing up much needed resources for other processes in SI.
Furthermore, the study found that sometimes it was sentence patterns associated with numbers (for example, comparing the growth rates of two periods) that posed a bigger problem in interpreting. The implication is that students should also familiarize themselves with these sentences patterns if they are to successfully handle numbers in SI.
6.4 Implications for Future Studies
This study adopted an independent groups design, and used matched-pairs random assignment based on working experience to assign participants into two
not directly related to working experience, possibly due to some extraneous factors that caused the professional interpreters to perform worse than usual on the day of experiment. As a result, one group’s average propositional accuracy score was significantly higher than that of the other group. This confounded the results on the effects of numbers on accuracy. For future studies using independent groups designs, a more stringent method of matched-pairs random assignment should be considered.
One approach would be having participants perform an interpreting task first, scoring their interpreting performance and then assigning them into groups based on their scores. Having said that, the reality in the interpreting community is that it is quite difficult to find participants who have are available and willing to participate in lengthy or repeated experiment sessions. A balance will have to be reached between ideal research designs and practical considerations.
This study investigated the effects of numbers in interpreting from English into Mandarin only, and all of the participants had Mandarin as their A language. It would be interesting to see if the same findings would immerge when interpreters interpret from Mandarin into English, or from their A language into B language.
The results from the present study suggest that individual differences play an important role in how numbers affect one’s performance in interpreting. Although possible factors contributing to the individual differences have emerged from the
study, further research is required to better understand the factors. Furthermore, it would be helpful to investigate what kind of training or practices are most beneficial to interpretation students experiencing particular difficulty in number interpreting.
