Divided attention in simultaneous interpreting

Abstract

Simultaneous interpreting is one of the most requiring activities. It does not equal listening to speech, translating and producing it. In this study we hypothesize that simultaneous interpreters would have a more profound noise filter system than a control group doing a similar demanding task. Thus, divided attention mechanisms of a simultaneous interpreter present as different from that of a person without simultaneous interpreting training during a cognitively demanding task: the gaze data shows that cognitive load, indirectly indicated by prolonged average fixation duration, is significantly greater for both control groups. When it comes to irrelevant information processing, the recall test results reveal that simultaneous interpreters’ perception filters are not tilted towards accumulating more incoming information than those of a person without simultaneous interpreting training, as we have previously hypothesized.