[New publication] Linguistic and psychological indicators of stress in simultaneous interpreting by Paweł Korpal

About this book:

This book is an attempt to discuss the notion of psychological stress in simultaneous interpreting. The main objective of the experimental study is to examine whether the speaker’s delivery rate influences (1) the level of stress experienced by professional interpreters and interpreting trainees in simultaneous interpreting and (2) interpreting accuracy. As well as this, predominant coping strategies used by interpreting trainees and professional interpreters are investigated in the study. The results of the experiment show that high delivery rate increases the level of stress experienced by the participants and has a detrimental effect on interpreting accuracy. A negative correlation between stress levels and interpreting accuracy was observed. Contrary to predictions, no inter-group difference was observed with regard to stress levels. However, professional interpreters provided a more accurate interpretation than interpreting trainees. With regards to stress coping, task-oriented coping proved to be a predominant coping style in both experimental groups. The results of the study may offer a valuable contribution to Interpreting Studies, stress research, occupational psychology and human factors in interpreting.