Simultaneous listening and speaking in English into Korean simultaneous interpretation

Abstract

One of the most outstanding characteristics of simultaneous interpretation, an example of complex human information processing, is the continuing overlapping of source language comprehension and target language production. Some 30 real-life English into Korean simultaneous interpretation audio tapes were analyzed to examine this unique feature. The results show that interpreters both listened and spoke for 61% of the total words uttered by speakers and 40% of total utterance time. The accuracy of the listening and speaking portion was found to be statistically poorer than that of the listening only portion. When the speaker's speech proportion increased, accuracy decreased due to reduced speaker pauses within the interpreter's speaking portion. As a whole, time simultaneity ratio and accuracy showed a negative correlation. However, the interpreter who increased speech proportion coupled with time simultaneity ratio showed better accuracy than the other when two interpreters worked on the same speech.