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Introducing New Hypertexts on Interpreting (Studies): A tribute to Franz Pöchhacker
Edited by Cornelia Zwischenberger, Karin Reithofer and Sylvi Rennert
[Benjamins Translation Library 160] 2023
► pp. 44–65

User expectations research revisited

Methodological considerations

| Hong Kong Baptist University

Survey-based user expectations research is an important line of research on quality in the domain of simultaneous conference interpreting. Its methodology has often been criticised for a lack of rigour. However, few have treated methodology as the focus of their discussion. In this chapter, a comprehensive overview of the methodological issues of survey-based user expectations research is provided, with topics covering the construct, criteria, instrument, response format, levels of measurement, measures of central tendency, and sampling. As an illustration for the methodology under discussion, the results of the classic study by Bühler (1986) are reanalysed by using different measures of central tendency. The chapter concludes with a discussion on the importance of incorporating users’ actual experience to make user-related research on interpreting more relevant.

Keywords: user expectations, survey, construct validity, quality criteria, user research
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • User expectations research: Methodology
  • The construct
    • The criteria
    • The instrument
    • Response format and levels of measurement
      • Multipoint rating
      • Rank-ordering
      • Combining multipoint rating and rank-ordering
    • Measures of central tendency
      • Bühler (1986) reanalysed
    • Sampling
  • User expectations research: Comparability issues
  • User expectations research: What to expect?
  • Conclusion
  • Acknowledgement
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 14 April 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.160.03liu
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