CHAPTER FIVE CONCLUSION
This case study is done with the purpose of exploring the shaded ST, which can
be divided into four types: simultaneous ST, consecutive ST, SI with text, and CI with
text. The type of ST applied in this study belongs to consecutive ST.
There are three groups of subjects in this research. Group A is of high
language proficiency and intensive ST training; Group B is of high language
proficiency but no ST training; Group C is of intermediate language proficiency and
some ST training. They perform the same ST task with the same steps and under the
same environment.
Their performances are divided into three dimensions for observation: 1.
fidelity, which includes miss- interpretation, omissions, and unnatural Chinese; 2. ST
chunking, which includes chunk- moving and chunk-connection; 3. delivery, which
includes backtracks, fillers, pauses, and time. The results are as follows:
5.1 Research Results
Group A, which possesses both high language proficiency and ST training,
does the best job in all three dimensions. Group B, which possesses high language
proficiency and zero ST training, ranks the second best in the first two dimensions.
Group C, which possesses rather lower language proficiency and ST training, takes
effective when there’s sufficient language proficiency, and, high language proficiency
without ST training is better than ST training without sufficient language proficiency.
That is, when conducting ST training, students’ language proficiency should be
fundamental and should be high enough. What can be improved through ST training
even without sufficient language proficiency are backtracks and fillers in the third
dimension, delivery.
Now take a closer look into the three dimensions of the results. In terms of
fidelity, three subsections: miss- interpretation, omissions, and translationese are
covered. For miss- interpretation, Group A has the fewest miss- interpreted units,
Group B the second fewest, and Group C the most. Here, Group C creates two times
more miss- interpreted units than the other two groups, which indicates that language
proficiency is the key influence here since Group A and B have similarly high
language proficiency while Group C has the lowest language proficiency of the three.
Moreover, it could also indicate that Group C doesn’t have enough language
proficiency for this speech text, which was meant for first year T & I students.
For omissions, the situation is the total opposite. That is, Group A has the
most omissions, Group B the second, and Group C the fewest. For the reasons of
omissions, insufficient ST efforts, avoidance, and terser renditions are all possibilities.
The most omissions from Group A indicate that it departs from the speech text the
most. This is more flexible yet more dangerous to the fidelity of the renditions.
Group C with the fewest omissions, is the most rigid by sticking to the speech text.
For unnatural Chinese, Group A has the fewest units, Group B the second
fewest, and Group C the most. And their gaps here are bigger than those in
miss- interpretation. The wider gap between Group A and Group B shows the effect
of ST training, while gap between Group B and C remains pretty much the same,
which still shows the influence of language proficiency.
The second dimension is chunking, which covers chunk- moving and
chunk-connection. Group A has the second fewest chunks that are moving too far
and the fewest unsuccessful chunk-connections. Group B has the most chunks
moving too far and the second fewest unsuccessful chunk-connections. Group C has
the fewest chunks moving too far and the most unsuccessful chunk-connections.
From the description above, it seems that Group C follow the chunking principle most
closely. However, its chunk-connection is the most unsuccessful. On the other
hand, Group B moves the chunks far the most, but its chunk-connection is more
successful. Although Group A has more chunks moving too far than Group C, its
chunk-connection is the most successful. Therefore, in terms of chunking, Group A
performs the best, Group B second, because chunk-connection, which can help the
audience understands better, is more important than chunk- moving, and Group C the
third. This also manifests the importance of language proficiency to ST training.
The third dimension is delivery, which covers backtracks, fillers, pauses, and
time spent. Group B has the most backtracks and fillers, Group C the second, and
Group A the fewest. However, for fillers, Group A and Group C are very close in
number while Group B has more than two times of fillers. As for pauses, Group A
has the fewest, Group B the second fewest, and Group C the most. For time spent,
Group A is the shortest, Group B the second, and Group C the longest. This
indicates that ST training can be effective on backtracks and fillers, even when
language proficiency is not high. ST training is not as effective on pause and time
when language proficiency is insufficient because poor comprehension hinders
reading speed.
5.2 Implications for ST Training
From the results above, one important finding emerges; that is, the two key
factors of a good ST performance — language proficiency and ST training — are
closely related. ST training won’t be effective without sufficient language
proficiency, and sufficient language proficiency alone is not enough for good ST
performance. Furthermore, language proficiency should be the groundwork of ST
training because the former influences the crucial part of ST, fidelity. Therefore,
student screening is very important. Students of similar language proficiencies
should be chosen based on the objective of the ST training.
Another implication is about delivery. The group without ST training tends to
backtrack and use fillers a lot more than the other two groups. Therefore, it proves
that ST training can help reduce backtracks and fillers. However, the group with
lower language proficiency tends to pause more and use more time than the other two
groups, which proves once again ST training won’t be effective without sufficient
language proficiency. This also tells us in the future ST training, avoidance of
pauses and time control can be stressed.
5.3 Room for Improvement
One defect about this thesis is the analysis being too subjective. There are
gray areas for miss-interpretation, omissions, and translationese, etc., and the
researcher is the only judge of them. If they are open for discussion, there will be a
lot of debate.
Another defect is the lack of theories. For example, the theories of
segmentation, chunking, etc. that can make the researcher’s judgment more
convincing are hard to find. There are so far only general introductions and not
detailed definitions for them.
Furthermore, this is only a one-time case study, so there are no follow-up
interviews or experiments. Many questions are left unanswered. For example,
when the subjects omit a phrase, is it out of carelessness or on purpose? Why don’t
they write any notes on the speech text? How have the subjects improved after some
more training? These require more future efforts to discover.
5.4 Suggestions for Future Studies
All the unanswered question in this study such as the motives behind their
omissions or backtracks, why they sight translate the article with or without notes, etc.
can be studied further.
Moreover, a comparison of the subjects of the same group at different times of
their ST training can help us see their progress through the training. Therefore, long
term research is called for in the future.
