The Impact Of Listening Anxiety On Students’ E-C Consecutive Interpretation Accuracy:An Empirical Study

Interpretation can be broken down into three different processes,namely listening input,comprehension,and interpretation output.Listening input is among the most important process in interpreting tasks,which has a direct impact on the quality of following comprehension and interpretation output.in listening input,factors like speakers’ accents,quality of listening materials,listening span can influence the accuracy of listening.And in this process,interpreters are often stuck in anxious feeling triggered by the factors mentioned above.Many previous studies have studied listening anxiety as a subbranch of interpretation anxiety,and many researchers have found that interpretation anxiety can influence the quality of interpretation performance in a negative way.Therefore,the research on the correlation between listening anxiety in interpreting tasks and interpretation accuracy is of great significance.This study designs an English to Chinese consecutive interpretation experiment plus an after-test questionnaire,in which 15 tested students majoring in English interpretation.The difficulty of the interpretation test material is reflected in the factors like its topics,speakers’accents,as well as speaking speeds.Students’interpretation performance is scored by two different researchers to have the average as their final scores,and their choices in the questionnaire are also quantified to get the level of their listening anxiety and daily interpretation learning anxiety.With the help of SPSS analysis software,it is found that there exists negative correlation between students’ listening anxiety and their English to Chinese consecutive interpretation accuracy,and higher listening anxiety leads to lower E-C consecutive interpretation accuracy.Besides,the results of the after-test questionnaire also reflect that those students are usually under high level of anxiety in their daily interpretation study and their learning motivation remains in a low level and the results of the questionnaire also highlight that listening anxiety is regarded as one of the major causes of anxiety in interpretation learning.Tested students are also found not confident about their interpretation performance and even their future career aspirations.From the analysis of the correlation between students’ listening anxiety and their E-C consecutive interpretation accuracy as well as their daily interpretation anxiety,the study provides implications for both interpretation teachers and learners:On the one hand,interpretation instructors should first understand the causes of students’ interpretation anxiety and they can adopt teaching methods like separated training zones in interpretation classroom to reduce students’ anxiety on interpretation;and teachers and instructors can also encourage students to adapt themselves to various listening materials so as to boost students confidence in listening comprehension.On the other hand,students can be more motivated to practice interpretation and overcome the difficulties in their studies;and they need to recognize and make up their shortcomings in interpretation learning and maintain cool-headed when faced with anxiety in interpreting to find measures to cope with their listening anxiety and to improve their interpretation performance.