| In consecutive interpreting (CI), interpreters usually face high pressure of multi-tasks including information receiving, memorizing and reproduction. Due to the limited memory capacity of human brain, note-taking (NT) is often regarded as an important tool to help alleviate the memory load and trigger memory and therefore plays a major role in enhancing the interpreter's performance.Although NT is a complicated activity involving listening, analyzing and writing, it is regarded by most interpreters as a matter of very personal style without regular patterns. Then, are there any regular patterns that feature the notes by interpreters at different levels? If there are, what are the possible causes? To answer the above questions, a case study was conducted, which provides the raw materials for this thesis.The theoretical foundations of this thesis are: the Effort Model of Daniel Gile, the Filter Theory of Donald E. Broadbent and the Information Processing System of David W. Carroll as well as other relevant ideas of Roderick Jones, Minhua Liu, Danica Seleskovitch and Virginia Yates.There are three groups of subjects in this study: Group A, 4 beginning student interpreters; Group B, 4 advanced student interpreters and Group C, 1 professional interpreter. The methodology adopted in this research is empirical. An experiment was carried out where the subjects were asked to interpret consecutively an English speech into Chinese, which was then followed by a questionnaire. Analysis was made based on the collected notes and answers and results in the following conclusion:Due to the differences in effort distribution, message filtering and information processing, the notes by interpreters at different professional levels follow their own regular patterns in terms of main ideas, links and logic and language choice. More practical experience and relevant trainings can help student interpreters to enhance their skills of NT.
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