A Survey Report On Interrogation Interpreters' Perception Of Work Safety

As Guangzhou is prospering in economy and is deepening it's opening-up to the outside world,more and more foreigners come to Guangzhou which results in an increasing number of foreigner-related law cases.Due to the demand of the police procedure and the regulation of the law,the need for interrogation interpreters is growing.However,interrogation interpreters in Guangzhou are mainly students who do not have related knowledge background and are not trained.They are hired by the translation agencies and introduced to provide interpreting service for legal institutions.Some interrogation interpreters said that they felt nervous and frightened during the interrogation process especially when they went to the interrogation site for the first few times.This psychological state made them consciously carry out some safety behaviors,for example,they intentionally keep a distance from the prisoners,omit some contents that might irritate the prisoner,and even change the original content to be interpreted.According to abundant review of literature,people's safety behavior is often closely connected to their safety perception level,because safety perception can influence their safety behavior and further influence their work performance.So,the author wants to research interrogation interpreters' perception of work safety and explore the influence of safety perception on safety behavior and work performance.According to Neal and Griffin's(2000)definition of and research on safety perception,safety perception refers to how employees view safety-related policies,procedures and other workplace attributes concerned with safety.So,in this survey,the author researched interrogation interpreters' perception of work safety from four aspects: education and training,police personnel,facilities,and regulations and procedure by using the method of questionnaire.Then,the author used the method of interview to explore the impact of interrogation interpreters' safety perception on their safety behaviors and work performance.The results of this research show that interrogation interpreters generally demonstrate a negative safety perception to two indicators: education and training,and facilities.The lack of training and education and some problems in facilities made them feel insecure,not confident and anxious during work.This insecurity and anxiety led to a few safety behaviors which further influenced their performance,for example,the accuracy and smoothness of interpreting and their confidence.The aim of this report is to send the research results to the translation agencies and higher institutes so that they may adjust their teaching contents or provide related lecture and training which will make student interpreters have a better understanding of interrogation interpreting and reduce their anxiety and fear during the interrogation interpreting work.