Turn-taking is a fundamental aspect of dialogue interpreting. Typically, dialogue interpreting is conducted in consecutive mode, and the interpreter participates in the exchange by taking every second turn (Bot 2005; Mason 2009). In this process, the interpreter does not merely translate primary speakers’ utterances, but is an active participant who is critically engaged in the negotiation of meaning and in the coordination of the interaction (Wadensjö 1998, 2018; Davidson 2002; Gavioli 2016; Gavioli and Wadensjö 2021). Although the interpreter participates in the interaction by taking turns, finding appropriate moments to take a turn is not an easy task. It is important that this process runs smoothly, as problems in turn-taking between the interpreter and the primary participants may affect the accuracy and fluency of the interpreter’s rendition and the overall success of communication (see Braun 2013; De Boe 2020; Vranjes and Bot 2021). Moreover, while taking part in the exchange, the interpreter is at the same time engaged in a cognitively demanding activity involving comprehension, memorization, and reproduction of the incoming turn in a target language (see Gile 1997). This may affect the interpreter’s turn-taking behavior. For instance, it has been argued that interpreters usually benefit from shorter primary speaker turns, since turns that are too long could overburden the interpreter’s memory capacity (Bot 2005; see also Englund Dimitrova 1997). Both the interpreter’s position in the exchange as a ‘mediating’ third party and their involvement in a cognitively complex task will inevitably have an impact on their decision for when to take the turn.

References

Anderson, Anne, Miles Bader, Ellen Gurman Bard, Elizabeth Boyle, Gwyneth Doherty, Simon Garrod, Stephen Isard, Jacqueline Kowtko, Jan McAllister, Jim Miller, Catherine Sotillo, Henry S. Thompson, and Regina Weinert

1991 “The HCRC Map Task Corpus.” Language and Speech 34: 83–97.

Auer, Peter

2005 “Projection in Interaction and Projection in Grammar.” Interdisciplinary Journal for the Study of Discourse 25 (1): 7–36.

Balota, David A., Melvin J. Yap, Keith A. Hutchinson, Michael J. Cortese, Brett Kessler, Bjorn Loftis, James H. Neely, Douglas L. Nelson, Greg B. Simpson, and Rebecca Treiman

2007 “The English Lexicon Project.” Behavioral Research Methods 39: 445–459.

Bates, Douglas, Martin Maechler, Ben Bolker, and Steven Walker

2014 “lme4: Linear Mixed-effects Models Using Eigen and S4. R package version 1.0-6.” http://​CRAN​.R​-project​.org​/package​=lme4

Bavelas, Janet B., Linda Coates, and Trudy Johnson

2002 “Listener Responses as a Collaborative Process: The Role of Gaze.” Journal of Communication 52 (3): 566–580.

Bot, Hanneke

2005 Dialogue Interpreting in Mental Health. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

Brady, Paul T.

1968 “A Statistical Analysis of On-Off Patterns in 16 Conversations.” Bell System Technical Journal 47 (1): 73–91.

Braun, Sabine

2013 “Keep Your Distance? Remote Interpreting in Legal Proceedings: A Critical Assessment of a Growing Practice.” Interpreting 15 (2): 200–228.

Brône, Geert, Bert Oben, Annelies Jehoul, Jelena Vranjes, and Kurt Feyaerts

2017 “Eye Gaze and Viewpoint in Multimodal Interaction Management.” Cognitive Linguistics 28 (3): 448–483.

Calhoun, Sasha, Jean Carletta, Jason M. Brenier, Neil Mayo, Dan Jurafsky, Mark Steedman, and David Beaver

2010 “The NXT-Format Switchboard Corpus: A Rich Resource for Investigating the Syntax, Semantics, Pragmatics and Prosody of Dialogue.” Language Resources and Evaluation 44 (4): 387–419.

Casillas, Marisa, and Michael C. Frank

2013 “The Development of Predictive Processes in Children’s Discourse Understanding.” In Cooperative Minds: Social Interaction and Group Dynamics, Proceedings of the 35th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Berlin, German, July 31 – August 3, 2013 , edited by Markus Knauff, Michael Pauen, Natalie Sebanz, and Ipke Wachsmuth, 299–304. Austin: Cognitive Science Society.

Couper-Kuhlen, Elizabeth

1993 English Speech Rhythm: Form and Function in Everyday Verbal Interaction. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Davidson, Brad

2002 “A Model for the Construction of Conversational Common Ground in Interpreted Discourse.” Journal of Pragmatics 34 (9): 1273–1300.

Davitti, Elena

2013 “Dialogue Interpreting as Intercultural Mediation: Interpreters’ Use of Upgrading Moves in Parent–Teacher Meetings.” Interpreting 15 (2): 168–199.

Davitti, Elena

2019 “Methodological Explorations of Interpreter-Mediated Interaction: Novel Insights from Multimodal Analysis.” In Multimodality: Methodological Explorations, edited by Rosie Flewitt, Sara Price, and Terhi Korkiakangas, special issue of Qualitative Research: 19 (1): 7–29.

De Boe, Esther

2020 Remote Interpreting in Healthcare Settings: A Comparative Study on the Influence of Telephone and Video Link Use on the Quality of Interpreter-Mediated Communication. PhD diss. University of Antwerp.

De Ruiter, Jan-Peter, Holger Mitterer, and Nick J. Enfield

2006 “Projecting the End of a Speaker’s Turn: A Cognitive Cornerstone of Conversation.” Language 82 (3): 515–535.

Edlund, Jens, Mattias Heldner, and Julia Hirschberg

2009 “Pause and Gap Length in Face-to-Face Interaction.” Proceedings Interspeech: 2779–2782.

Englund Dimitrova, Birgitta

1997 “Degree of Interpreter Responsibility in the Interaction Process in Community Interpreting.” In The Critical Link: Interpreters in the Community: Papers from the 1st International Conference on Interpreting in Legal, Health and Social Service Settings, Geneva Park, Canada, 1–4 June 1995, edited by Silvana E. Carr, Roda P. Roberts, Aideen Dufour, and Dini Steyn, 147–164. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Englund Dimitrova, Birgitta, and Elisabet Tiselius

2016 “Cognitive Aspects of Community Interpreting: Toward a Process Model.” In Reembedding Translation Process Research, edited by Ricardo Muñoz Martín, 195–214. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Ford, Cecilia E., and Sandra A. Thompson

1996 “Interactional Units in Conversation: Syntactic, Intonational, and Pragmatic Resources for the Management of Turns.” In Interaction and Grammar, edited by Elinor Ochs, Emanuel A. Schegloff, and Sandra A. Thompson, 134–184. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Fox, John, and Sanford Weisberg

2019 An R Companion to Applied Regression, 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks: Sage.

Gavioli, Laura

2016 “Conversation Analysis.” In Researching Translation and Interpreting, edited by Claudia V. Angelelli and Brian James Baer, 185–194. Abingdon: Routledge.

Gavioli, Laura, and Cecilia Wadensjö

2021 “Reflections on Doctor Question – Patient Answer Sequences and on Lay Perceptions of Close Translation.” In When Clinicians and Patients Do Not Speak the Same Language – Interpreting in Health Care, edited by Claudio Baraldi and Laura Gavioli, special issue of Health Communication 36 (9): 1–11.

Gile, Daniel

1997 “Conference Interpreting as a Cognitive Management Problem.” In Cognitive Processes in Translation and Interpreting, edited by Joseph H. Danks, Gregory M. Shreve, Stephen B. Fountain, and Michael McBeath, 196–214. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Hayashi, Makoto

2013 “Turn Allocation and Turn Sharing.” In The Handbook of Conversation Analysis, edited by Jack Sidnell and Tanya Stivers, 167–190. Chichester: Wiley Blackwell.

Heldner, Mattias, and Jens Edlund

2010 “Pauses, Gaps and Overlaps in Conversations.” Journal of Phonetics 38 (4): 555–568.

Helgason, Pétur

2006 “SMTC: A Swedish Map Task Corpus.” Proceedings from Fonetik 2006: 57–60.

Heritage, John

1997 “Conversation Analysis and Institutional Talk: Analysing Data.” In Qualitative Research: Theory, Method and Practice, edited by David Silverman, 161–182. London: Sage.

Holler, Judith, and Kobin H. Kendrick

2015 “Unaddressed Participants’ Gaze in Multi-Person Interaction: Optimizing Recipiency.” In Holler et al. (2015a, 76–89).

Holler, Judith, Kobin H. Kendrick, Marisa Casillas, and Stephen C. Levinson

eds. 2015a Turn-Taking in Human Communicative Interaction, special issue of Frontiers in Psychology 6.

Holler, Judith, Kobin H. Kendrick, Marisa Casillas, and Stephen C. Levinson

2015b “Editorial: Turn-Taking in Human Communicative Interaction.” In Holler et al. (2015a, 6–9).

Jefferson, Gail

1974 “Error Correction as an Interactional Resource.” Language in Society 3 (2): 181–199.

Kendon, Adam

1967 “Some Functions of Gaze-Direction in Social Interaction.” Acta Psychologica 26: 22–63.

Kendrick, Kobin H., and Francisco Torreira

2015 “The Timing and Construction of Preference: A Quantitative Study.” Discourse Processes 52 (4): 255–289.

Komter, Martha

2013 “Conversation Analysis in the Courtroom.” In The Handbook of Conversation Analysis, edited by Jack Sidnell and Tanya Stivers, 612–629. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

Lammertink, Imme, Marisa Casillas, Titia Benders, Brechtje Post, and Paula Fikkert

2015 “Dutch and English Toddlers’ Use of Linguistic Cues in Predicting Upcoming Turn Transitions.” In Holler et al. (2015a, 279–291).

Levinson, Stephen C.

1983 Pragmatics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Levinson, Stephen C., and Francisco Torreira

2015 “Timing in Turn-Taking and Its Implications for Processing Models of Language.” In Holler et al. (2015a 10–26).

Licoppe, Christian, and Clair-Antoine Veyrier

2020 “The Interpreter as a Sequential Coordinator in Courtroom Interaction: ‘Chunking’ and the Management of Turn Shifts in Extended Answers in Consecutively Interpreted Asylum Hearings with Remote Participants.” Interpreting 22 (1): 56–86.

Mason, Ian

2009 “Role, Positioning and Discourse in Face-to-Face Interpreting.” In Interpreting and Translating in Public Service Settings: Policy, Practice, Pedagogy, edited by Raquel De Pedro Ricoy, Isabelle Perez, and Christine Wilson, 52–73. Manchester: St Jerome.

Mason, Ian

2012 “Gaze, Positioning and Identity in Interpreter-Mediated Dialogues.” In Coordinating Participation in Dialogue Interpreting, edited by Claudio Baraldi and Laura Gavioli, 177–199. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Oostdijk, Nelleke

2000 “Het Corpus Gesproken Nederlands [Corpus of spoken Dutch].” Nederlandse Taalkunde 3: 280–284.

Pasquandrea, Sergio

2011 “Managing Multiple Actions through Multimodality: Doctors’ Involvement in Interpreter-Mediated Interactions.” Language in Society 40 (4): 455–481.

Plevoets, Koen, and Bart Defrancq

2016 “The Effect of Informational Load on Disfluencies in Interpreting: A Corpus-Based Regression Analysis.” Translation and Interpreting Studies 11 (2): 202–224.

Plevoets, Koen, and Bart Defrancq

2018 “The Cognitive Load of Interpreters in the European Parliament: A Corpus-Based Study of Predictors for the Disfluency uh(m) .” Interpreting 20 (1): 1–32.

Roberts, Seán G., Francisco Torreira, and Stephen C. Levinson

2015 “The Effects of Processing and Sequence Organization on the Timing of Turn Taking: A Corpus Study.” In Holler et al. (2015a, 119–134).

Rogers, Shane L., Craig P. Speelman, Oliver Guidetti, and Melissa Longmuir

2018 “Using Dual Eye Tracking to Uncover Personal Gaze Patterns During Social Interaction.” Scientific Reports 8: 1–8.

Sacks, Harvey, Emanuel A. Schegloff, and Gail Jefferson

1974 “A Simplest Systematics for the Organization of Turn-Taking for Conversation.” Language 50 (4): 696–735.

Seeber, Kilian G.

2011 “Cognitive Load in Simultaneous Interpreting: Existing Theories – New Models.” Interpreting 13 (2): 176–204.

Selting, Margret

1996 “On the Interplay of Syntax and Prosody in the Constitution of Turn-Constructional Units and Turns in Conversation.” In Interaction-Based Studies of Languages, edited by Cecilia E. Ford and Johannes Wagner, special issue of Pragmatics 6 (3): 371–388.

Setton, Robin

1999 Simultaneous Interpretation: A Cognitive-Pragmatic Analysis. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Stivers, Tanya, and Nick J. Enfield

2010 “A Coding Scheme for Question–Response Sequences in Conversation.” Journal of Pragmatics 42 (10): 2620–2626.

Stivers, Tanya, Nick J. Enfield, Penelope Brown, Christina Englert, Makoto Hayashi, Trine Heinemann, Gertie Hoymann, et al.

2009 “Universals and Cultural Variation in Turn-Taking in Conversation.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 106 (26): 10587–10592.

Tiselius, Elisabet, and Kayle Sneed

2020 “Gaze and Eye Movement in Dialogue Interpreting: An Eye-Tracking Study.” In Interpreting: A Window into Bilingual Processing, edited by Yanping Dong and Ping Li, special issue of Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 23 (4): 780–787.

Van Besien, Fred

1999 “Anticipation in Simultaneous Interpretation.” Meta 44 (2): 250–259.

Vranjes, Jelena

2018 On the Role of Eye Gaze in the Coordination of Interpreter-Mediated Interactions: An Eye-Tracking Study. PhD diss. KU Leuven.

Vranjes, Jelena, Geert Brône, and Kurt Feyaerts

2018 “On the Role of Gaze in the Organization of Turn-Taking and Sequence Organization in Interpreter-Mediated Dialogue.” Language and Dialogue 8 (3): 439–467.

Vranjes, Jelena, Hanneke Bot, Kurt Feyaerts, and Geert Brône

2018 “Displaying Recipiency in an Interpreter-Mediated Dialogue: An Eye-Tracking Study.” In Eye-Tracking in Interaction: Studies on the Role of Eye Gaze in Dialogue, edited by Geert Brône and Bert Oben, 303–324. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Vranjes, Jelena, and Hanneke Bot

2021 “A Multimodal Analysis of Turn-Taking in Interpreter-Mediated Psychotherapy.” Translation & Interpreting 13 (1): 101–117.

Wadensjö, Cecilia

1998 Interpreting as Interaction. London: Longman.

Wadensjö, Cecilia

2018 “Involvement, Trust and Topic Control in Interpreter-Mediated Healthcare Encounters.” In Interpreter-Mediated Healthcare Encounters, edited by Srikant Sarangi, special issue of Communication & Medicine 15 (2): 165–176.

Wittenburg, Peter, Hennie Brugman, Albert Russel, Alex Klassmann, and Hans Sloetjes

2006 “ELAN: A Professional Framework for Multimodality Research.” In Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC 2006), edited by Nicoletta Calzolari, Khalid Choukri, Aldo Gangemi, Bente Maegaard, Joseph Mariani, Jan Odijk, and Daniel Tapias, 1556–1559. Genoa: ELRA.