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Processing German verb-final structures in simultaneous interpreting: TEPR evidence
Introduction
Kilian G. Seeber
MethodologyIntroductionThe distance locality theory put forward by Gibson (1998a,b, 2000), whichsuggests an increment in processing cost proportional to the distance ofdependent constituents to the head, does not seem to apply to German verb-final structures (Scheepers et al. 1999, Koniezny & Döring 2003), which areintegrated without an apparent increase in processing demands. The extent, towhich verb-final structures cause an increase in cognitive load in simultaneousinterpreting, more specifically when interpreting into a verb-initial language, isstill disputed in the literature (Seleskovitch 1984, Moser-Mercer 1994, Massaro& Shlesinger 1994, Setton 1999, Seeber 2001, 2005), partly because of thedearth of empirical research addressing the issue.In this project we set out to test the hypotheses that, all other things being
MethodologyParticipants: n=8 professional conference interpretersTask: simultaneous interpreting of sentence clustersMaterials: 50 sentence clusters (intro, item, extro)
16 SVO, 16 SOV, 18 Fillers (randomized)Example: (intro) Das Obst stammt aus dem letzten Jahr.
(item) Ich denke, die Apfel überstehen den Winter durch die richitge Lagerung.(extro) Sie sind immernoch saftig und frisch.
IV: syntactic structure (SVO, SOV)DV: cognitive load (pupil dilation)In this project we set out to test the hypotheses that, all other things being
equal, simultaneously interpreting a German SOV structure into an SVOlanguage (e.g. English) will entail more cognitive load than a German SVOstructure. In an experiment, eight professional conference interpreters eachinterpreted 16 German SVO structures and 16 German SOV structures,presented in random order and masked by 18 non related syntactic structures,into English. Online cognitive load was assessed by measuring TEPRs (TaskEvoked Pupillary Responses).
Hypothesis : H1: L [SI(SOV->SVO)] > L [SI(SVO->SVO)]
g (p p )CV: word frequency, controlled
cognates, controlledabstractness, controlledprosody, controlled
Apparatus: Eyelink II eyetracker, (250hz)
yp 1 [ (SOV->SVO)] [ (SVO->SVO)]All other things being equal, cognitive load (L) will be larger while interpreting simultaneously (SI) an SOV structure into a language requiring an SVO structure,than while interpreting simultaneously a SVO structure into a language requiring an SVO structure.
ResultsThe results reveal a clear trend suggesting that cognitive loadduring simultaneous interpreting of German SOV structures intoEnglish is higher than during simultaneous interpreting of GermanSVO structures. Although a repeated measures ANOVA failed toreach significance (F(1,7) =2.57, p=.15), a t-test for paired samplesreveals a significantly larger peak dilation (t(7)=-3.73, p<.01), andthus of maximum cognitive load (Beatty 1982) for simultaneousinterpreting of SOV structures.interpreting of SOV structures.
ConclusionThese results corroborate the working hypothesis H1 and provideempirical evidence challenging a view postulating the irrelevanceof structural characteristics of languages in simultaneousinterpreting as suggested by Seleskovitch 1984.
Processing German verb-final structures in simultaneous interpreting: TEPR evidence
Kilian G. Seeber
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Moser-Mercer, B. (1994). Paradigms gained or the art of productivedisagreement. In: S. Lambert & B. Moser-Mercer (eds), Bridging thegap: Empirical research in simultaneous interpreting (pp.17-23).
Gibson, E. (2000). The dependency locality theory: A distance-based theory of linguistic complexity. In, Y. Miyashita, A. Marantzand W. O’Neil (eds): Image, language, brain (pp. 95-126).Cambridge, Ma: MIT Press.Gibson, E. (1998). Linguistic complexity: Locality of syntacticdependencies. Cognition 68: 1-76.Konieczny, L. & Döring, P. (2003). Anticipation of clause-finalheads. Evidence from eye-tracking and SRNs. In: P.P. Slazek (ed):Proceedings of the International Conference on Cognitive Science,July 13-17 2003 (pp 330-335) University of New South Wales
g p p p g (pp )Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Scheepers, C., Hemforth, B., & Konieczny, L. (1999). Incrementalprocessing of German verb-final constructions: Predicting the verb’sminimum (!) valency. In: Proceedings of the Second InternationalConference on Cognitive Science (ICCS/JCS99),Tokyo, July 27-30,1999.Seeber, K. G. (2005). Temporale Aspekte der Antizipation beimSimultandolmetschen komplexer SOV-Strukturen aus demDeutschen. In: A. Künzli (ed), Empirical research into translation andinterpreting: Products and processes Bulletin Suisse de linguistiqueJuly 13 17, 2003, (pp. 330 335), University of New South Wales,
Sydney, Australia.Massaro, D., & Shlesinger, M. (1997). Information processing and acomputational approach to the study of simultaneous interpretation.Interpreting, 2(1/2): 13-53.
interpreting: Products and processes. Bulletin Suisse de linguistiqueappliqué, 81 (pp.123-149).Seeber, K. G. (2001). Intonation and anticipation in simultaneousinterpreting. In: A. Auchlin (ed), Cahiers de Linquistique Française23 (pp. 61-97).Seleskovitch, D. (1984). Les anticipations de la compréhension. In:D. Seleskovitch & M. Lederer (eds), Interpréter pour traduire (pp.273-283). Paris: Didier Erudition.
