A Study On Consecutive Interpretation From The Perspective Of Working Memory

Consecutive interpretation, one branch of interpretation, is a kind of highly complicated bilingual activity that is restricted by time. When the source utterance stops, the interpreter needs to immediately reformulate it in the target language. In interpreting, the interpreter goes through a series of cognitive processing activities such as attending to the message, analyzing the message for meaning, maintaining the message, and finally reformulating the message in the target language. These activities, concurrent in nature and restricted by time, put heavy cognitive load on the interpreter. Errors and omissions occur when the interpreter cannot meet the high processing capacity requirements.To understand the cognitive load, this thesis uses the construct of working memory as a theoretical framework to analyze the interpreter's mechanism of information processing. From the interdisciplinary perspective, it makes a detailed scientific analysis of the interpreter's comprehension process, information maintenance and retrieval to reveal the required processing capacity. Next, it studies some major factors that may affect the accuracy of working memory. The study in this respect sheds light on the question that this thesis sets out to answer: how to acquire the expertise of consecutive interpretation?In the last part, the thesis examines the differences between expert and novice performance to figure out the strong points of expert and skilled interpreters. Based on this understanding, it points out some key strategies needed to elevate the performance. Finally, it concludes that expertise is obtained by extensive deliberate practice of appropriate strategies.