A Study Of The Effectiveness Of Training On Interpreter Ethics In Police Interpreting

In recent years,more people around the world have come to China against the background of globalization.This brings opportunities for international exchanges and cooperation,but it also poses problems like more foreign-related cases.The difficulty that the police officers face is a severe shortage of qualified interpreters who work in police stations.Unprofessional behavior like inaccurate renditions or getting overinvolved exists in the performance of ad hoc and untrained interpreters,which may influence the outcome of the case.In China,police interpreting is still in the early stages.There is no official professional standard and code of ethics in this field,and few training courses aim at police interpreting.Since 2017,Xiamen Municipal Bureau of Public Security has built think tanks with the College of Foreign Languages and Cultures,Xiamen University.Our college started to send interpreters to local police stations.Due to the lack of training and experience,student interpreters who worked in police interviews often encountered situations that put them into ethical dilemmas.To address this issue,the training on professional ethics in police interpreting was set up in our college.This dissertation seeks to gauge to what extent the training impacts on students’ understanding of interpreter ethics in police settings.In the current study,38 postgraduate students in translation and interpreting were exposed to pre-and post-intervention tests.Changes in their perceptions of interpreter ethics were examined through a questionnaire on interpreter ethics.Students’evaluation of the course and suggestions were further explored based on their thoughts in the column named "notes" following each statement and the interview of 18 participants.The design of the questionnaire adopted the framework in the AUSIT Code of Ethics including nine principles.Results showed that(1)Divergent opinions existed in students’ perceptions of interpreter ethics in police settings,in which impartiality,accuracy and role boundaries had the lowest agreement percentages.Meanwhile,traditional cultural factors affected Chinese students’ decision on ethics.(2)Participants’ choices were more consistent with the code of ethics and the code of conduct in the post-test,thus the training was conducive to deepening students’understanding of interpreter ethics.(3)Based on the interview and the notes,all the interviewees agreed that they had a better understanding of interpreter ethics in police settings.For instance,more students started to seriously consider the influence of their behavior on the investigation results.They also suggested that organizing the police station observation and adding case studies could help them gain an insight into police interpreting.To conclude,the training on interpreter ethics in police interpreting is effective in deepening students’ understanding of interpreter ethics.Training on professional ethics for interpreters should be promoted.