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Article published In:
Translation, Cognition & Behavior
Vol. 5:2 (2022) ► pp.250–274
Thematic section

Testing the impact of remote interpreting settings on interpreter experience and performance

Methodological challenges inside the virtual booth

ORCID logo | Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań
ORCID logo | Università di Bologna

This paper presents methodological challenges in a study focusing on the impact of remote interpreting settings on interpreter experience and performance. In recent years, the practice of simultaneous interpreting has undergone a robust development with the quick uptake of remote interpreting technologies due to the global pandemic. In order to investigate remote interpreting, we created the Inside the Virtual Booth project encompassing a survey and an experimental study. We report on selected results of the survey that directly inform the experimental study design. We focus on challenges related to the compromise between experimental control and ecological validity, creation of materials and selection of dependent variables, including eyetracking measures that cannot be directly applied from reading studies to a study involving multimodal content typical for remote interpreting assignments. The paper may serve as a source of methodological guidance to scholars entering the field of experimental translation and interpreting studies.

Keywords: remote simultaneous interpreting, methodology, eyetracking, interpreting studies, virtual booth
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The ‘Inside the virtual booth’ project
  • 3.Stage one: Survey
    • 3.1Design and piloting
    • 3.2Demographics
    • 3.3Expertise
    • 3.4Selected results: Insights for the experimental stage
  • 4.Stage two: Experimental study
    • 4.1Study design
      • 4.1.1Participants
      • 4.1.2Materials: Challenges when matching experimental stimuli
    • 4.2Dependent variables
      • 4.2.1Eyetracking measures as an index of processing in RSI
      • 4.2.2Accuracy as an index of performance in RSI
      • 4.2.3Questionnaire data as indices of subjective experience in RSI
  • 5.Conclusions
  • References
Published online: 14 November 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tcb.00068.chm
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