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Lebende Sprachen

Zeitschrift für interlinguale und interkulturelle Kommunikation

[Living Languages]

Ed. by Schmitt, Peter A. / Lee-Jahnke, Hannelore

2 Issues per year


CiteScore 2016: 0.04

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1868-0267
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Volume 59, Issue 2

Issues

The Interpreter’s Delivery: A Spotlight on User Perceptions

The Influence of Hesitation and Self-correction on the User’s Perception of the Interpreter and of the Quality of Interpretation

Kim Park
Published Online: 2014-10-17 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/les-2014-0010

Abstract

Based on the view that the listener’s perspective is a vital component of defining quality in interpreting, and on an interest in studying users’ instinctive responses rather than conscious expectations, this study examines listeners’ reactions to two different deliveries of the same interpretation. Through the use of a controlled experiment simulating a real life conference situation, the impact of hesitation and self-correction was measured on an audience of 16 listeners who were unaware of the question at hand. The results showed fairly conclusively that hesitation exerted a lesser adverse influence on the user than self-correction.

Although still a relatively young field of research, user and interpreter expectations of quality in interpreting have been investigated by researchers around the world. This study uses existing knowledge as a springboard to explore the possibility of testing users’ unwitting responses to staged interpretations with certain variables controlled, in order to better define specific factors which influence their perception of both the interpreter, and the quality of interpretation.

Keywords: quality; delivery; hesitation; self-correction; user’s perception

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About the article

Published Online: 2014-10-17

Published in Print: 2014-11-01


Citation Information: Lebende Sprachen, Volume 59, Issue 2, Pages 276–330, ISSN (Online) 1868-0267, ISSN (Print) 0023-9909, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/les-2014-0010.

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