Transcript Document

TrIn 3101: Introduction
to Interpreting
Unit 3 continued:
A. Linguistic, Cultural, Situational
and Professional Tasks of
Interpreting
B. Memory Topics
Modified homework due 9/29/04
 Read the following articles:
 Vásquez pp. 155-57
 The Interpreting Process pp. 173-186
 General Issues pp. 187-198
 Write one thought question for each article.
 Read again the article “The Problem with
Interpreters: Communicating with
Spanish-Speaking Patients” by Vásquez
and Javier (text pp. 155-157).

Write the answers to the questions on handout
3-6 from Unit 3 (9/22/04).
Unit 3
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Unit 3 continued: Goals
1) Review: Definition 4) Identify some of
of culture
the linguistic
issues in finding
2) Identify culture
appropriate
issues that impact
equivalents in a
communication
cross-cultural
(video)
medical encounter
3) Identify possible
5) Memory topics,
cultural conflicts
memory
in an interpreted
enhancement
encounter in a
techniques and
community setting
exercises
Unit 3
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The Bilingual Medical Interview II:
The Geriatric Interview
The scenes depict medical interviews by
physicians with non-English speaking
geriatric patients. Each of the segments is
an edited version of a complete visit,
including a history, physical exam and
review of medicines.These vignettes are
designed to highlight points of interest
regarding geriatric clinical issues, crosscultural concerns and techniques for the
bilingual interview.
Unit 3
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Cultural issues: a review
As each scene is shown on the video
dealing with geriatric medical
interviews:
a) circle the cultural areas of
conflict observed
b) briefly identify the specific
conflict(s) demonstrated in each
vignette
c) How might/should the
interpreter deal with each conflict?
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Video: the geriatric interview
Scene 1
 House call:
Mature daughter
interprets for
elderly Spanishspeaking mother
who is a bilateral
amputee with an
unstable heart
condition
Age/status
 Gender
 Beliefs and values
 Verbal and
non-verbal
communication

Unit 3
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Video: the geriatric interview
Scene 2
Age/status
 hospital room:  Gender
 Beliefs and
young nephew
values
interprets for
elderly Chinese  Verbal and
non-verbal
uncle
communication

Unit 3
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Video: the geriatric interview
Scene 3
 house call:
Hindi-speaking
female nurse
interprets for
elderly female
patient
Age/status
 Gender
 Beliefs and
values
 Verbal and
non-verbal
communication

Unit 3
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Video: the geriatric interview
Scene 4
 Male physician +
male interpreter
 pre-interview
consultation
 interview with
elderly Spanishspeaking male
Age/status
 Gender
 Beliefs and
values
 Verbal and
non-verbal
communication

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Discussion of cultural issues:
areas of potential conflict
• Handout 3-3 (group of 3-4):
From his/her native culture
perspective, each student will
first identify at least one
category in each of the four
listed areas that may cause a
conflict in a medical
interview.
• Individually, please share
with the group what those
conflicts entail.
• Discuss how an interpreter
might resolve each conflict.
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Linguistic issues
Group application activity 3-5 (from week 9/22)
1. Divide into groups of 3-4, preferably with
individuals from at least two different
cultures.
2. Answer the following questions on your
handout based on the norms of your
“native language” culture. Assuming a
medical encounter in a doctor’s office,
give one answer for each question.
3. How might any of these factors influence
an interpreted encounter?
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Linguistic Issues: discussion
1. Introductions
(verbal and nonverbal)
2. Concept of time
3. Seating
arrangementsspatial intimacy?
4. Appropriate vs.
inappropriate
questions and
topics
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Linguistic issues: discussion
5. What is said at
the beginning of
an interaction?
6. Addressing each
other: first, last
names, titles?
7. Who makes the
decisions?
8. How to signal an
encounter is over?
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Linguistic issues: discussion
9. How formal or
informal are people?
10. What is the polite
way to interrupt?
11. How can age,
status or gender
affect an
interaction?
12. How important is
“saving face”?
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Cognate comedy

A TA was trying out her English, and said to a
professor, "Excuse me, may I molest you for a
moment?"

We have 2 adopted children who were 11 and 13
when we adopted them in Costa Rica. One had a
detention at school after he had been in the US
for about 6 months - he kept telling other
children that they shouldn't "piss" on the grass.
(pisar = to step on)
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How many of these items do you recall
after 10 seconds?
In English?
In Spanish?
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Memory Topics
for Interpreters
Objectives
 The student should be able to:
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Review/identify the three stages involved in
memory
Describe the four phases of memory tasks
Discuss general properties of memory
Explain the Stroop Effect
Apply techniques and mnemonic devices for
memory enhancement in interpreting:



Association
Visualization
Acronyms
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Power of the human mind:
The paomnnehil pweor of the hmuan mnid.
Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde
Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the
ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is
taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit
pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can
sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the
huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef,
but the wrod as a wlohe.
Amzanig eh?
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Memory Flow Chart
The flowchart for the theory of memory
indicates that all incoming information
first passes through Sensory Memory (SM)
before it enters ShortTerm Memory
(STM). There it can be maintained by
rehearsal and either successfully encoded
for storage in LongTerm Memory (LTM) or
forgotten. In retrieval, the information
passes from LTM back to STM, where it
enters our consciousness.
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Three Stages of Memory
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Types of Memory
 Short Term Memory
- Where sensory data is first
transmitted to for processing and
evaluation
- Aging impacts the depth of
processing that occurs in STM,
sending less to LTM
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Types of Memory
 Long Term Memory
- Where STM is encoded for long-term
storage and future retrieval
 How quickly and reliably we recall it
depends on:
 Activation:
How long since we last used the
information.
 Strength: How well we have practiced it.
 Archival Memory (a type of LTM)
- Used in the ultra-long term storage of
memories
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Long Term Memory
Varieties of Long Term Memory
Retrospective
[pertains to the past]
Declarative
Episodic
Semantic
Prospective
[future events]
Procedural
Cognitive
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Motor
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Working Memory
 Why
can we rehearse only limited
information at a time?
 Rehearsal limitations are due to limits
in how long it takes verbal material to
decay, not how many items we can
store. Hence, the faster we can
rehearse, the more we can store
(Baddeley, 1986).
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Memory terms
 Memory is a complex mental function
having four distinct phases:
 (1)
encoding or learning
 (2) retention
 (3) recall/retrieval
 (4) recognition
 Clinically, it is usually subdivided into
immediate, recent, and remote
memory.
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Retention
 The persistence to perform a learned
behavior (facts or experiences) after
an interval has elapsed in which there
has been no performance or practice
of the behavior.
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Memory Theory
 Recognition vs. Recall Issues
- Recognition - seeing something and
knowing what it is
- Recall - very construction oriented;
requires making connections

The process whereby a representation of past
experience is elicited.
- As we age, our recognition abilities get
stronger while recall weakens
- Recognition scenarios (like multiple choice
exams) are better for older learners
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Mnemonic
 'Mnemonic' is another word for
memory tool. Mnemonics are methods
for remembering information that is
otherwise quite difficult to recall.
The basic principle of mnemonics is to
use as many of the best functions of
your brain as possible to store
information.
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Use Your Whole Mind To Remember
 By coding language and numbers in
striking images, you can reliably code
both information and the structure
of information. You can then easily
recall these later.
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You can do the following things to make
your mnemonics more memorable:
 Use positive, pleasant images. The brain
often blocks out unpleasant ones.
 Use vivid, colorful, sense-laden images these are easier to remember than drab
ones.
 Use all your senses to code information or
dress up an image. Remember that your
mnemonic can contain sounds, smells,
tastes, touch, movements and feelings as
well as pictures.
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Mnemonics continued . . .
 Give your image three dimensions, movement and




space to make it more vivid. You can use movement
either to maintain the flow of association, or to
help you to remember actions.
Exaggerate the size of important parts of the
image
Use humor! Funny or peculiar things are easier to
remember than normal ones.
Similarly rude rhymes are very difficult to forget!
Symbols (red traffic lights, pointing fingers, road
signs, etc.) can code quite complex messages
quickly and effectively.
Unit 3
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How does our memory work?
 We remember things by association. Every piece
of information in our memory is connected to
other pieces in some way or another. For example,
if you are given the word "apple", what do you
think of? Perhaps something like this:

APPLE: red, round, sweet, teacher, tree, fruit
 But it's unlikely that we might see "apple" and
think of "dog". And what if you were asked what
the 7th letter of the alphabet was? Chances are,
you wouldn't know that "G = 7," but you could
easily think to yourself, "A B C D E F G," and then
say "G". You used association to get to the letter
G, because you knew A was the first letter, then
you kept choosing the next letter in the sequence
until you got to the right one.
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Association
 If memory works by association, we
actively work to create an association
between two bits of information. For
example, for the plane that we need to
catch at 2 P.M., we can imagine the plane in
our mind, and notice that it has 2 wings.
Two wings, 2 P.M. There's an association by
means of a visualization. We are now ten
times more likely to remember the takeoff time long after it has faded from our
short-term memory.
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Association
 When pieces of information are not obviously
related in any way, however, we have to be a bit
more creative in linking things together. But it
isn't as hard as it seems. Most of us learned
rhymes and acronyms in school that helped us
remember things. Do any of the following look
familiar to you?
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
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
i before e except after c, or when sounded like a as in
neighbor and weigh (rule for remembering ei or ie)
ROY G. BIV (colors of the rainbow)
All Cows Eat Grass; Every Good Boy Does Fine (notes of
musical scale)
Never Eat Sour Watermelons (directions on a compass)
Unit 3
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Association exercise
 To demonstrate how effectively this
works, look at the following list of
words, and try to come up with an
association between the left word
and the right word of each row.
Some will be easy; others may be
harder. As an example, for the first
pair, you might want to imagine a
mouse that has a long, wavy tail that
is in the shape of the letter S.
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Association exercise
 mouse
S
R
bridge
boat
chair
pancake
canal
triangle
 fur
 train
 moat
 popcorn
 elephant
 toothbrush
 umbrella
Unit 3
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Association exercise
 After you have formed the
associations, cover up the right side
of the list and then try to name the
word associated with each word on
the left. If you formed vivid, clear
associations, you may be surprised at
how quickly and easily you were able
to remember everything!
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Association exercise
 mouse
 fur
 train
 moat
 popcorn
 elephant
 toothbrush
 umbrella
Unit 3
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Other properties of memory:
 Law of Recency:
 We are more likely to remember things
that happened recently than those that
happened a long time ago. You can
probably remember what you had for
dinner yesterday, but not what you ate
for dinner two weeks ago today.
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Law of Recency
 A list of 20 words will be read. Try
to remember as many of the words
as possible. Write down the words
that you can remember immediately
after reading the list.
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List of words
cat
square
box
milk
arrow
apple
head
car
fish
flower
ball
house
king
book
key
Unit 3
tree
door
hammer
tape
shoe
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Law of Recency . . . and Primacy
 This type of experiment provides
evidence that there are 2 types of
memory processes. It is thought that
memory is good for the words read last
because they are still in short term
memory - this is the recency effect.
Memory is good for the words read first
because they made it into long term
memory - this is the primacy effect.
Unit 3
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Memory properties
 Law of Vividness:
 We tend to remember the most
spectacular or striking impressions
rather than those that are more
ordinary. You can probably remember
what you did on your last birthday, or
perhaps the events of 9/11, but not what
happened on the previous day of those
occasions (unless, that too, was a
"special" occasion).
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Law of Vividness:
 We are much better at remembering
pictures than we are at remembering
words and names. There are probably
biological and evolutionary reasons
for that. When subjects are asked to
recognize a small set of photos that
they saw the previous day from a
larger set, they typically recognize
around 97%.
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Concrete Words, Abstract
Words and Nonsense
 The ability to recall a word depends on
how meaningful the word is to a person.
Along with the meaningfulness of a word,
the "concreteness" of a word is
important for memory. Concreteness
refers to the ability of a word to form a
mental image. A word with high
concreteness is easy to "see"; a word
with low concreteness (an "abstract"
word) is difficult to visualize.
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Concrete words
 Here are three lists of words:
concrete words, abstract words and
nonsense words. See which list is
easier to memorize. You could also
read these lists to other people to
see how many words from each list
they remember.
Unit 3
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Concrete words
alligator
apple
arrow
baby
bird
book
butterfly
car
corn
flower
hammer
house
lemon
microscope
ocean
pencil
rock
shoes
table
window
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Abstract words
honor
hope
idea
interest
knowledge
mercy
mood
moral
theory
truth
anger
belief
boredom
chance
concept
effort
fate
freedom
glory
happiness
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Nonsense words
lumal
mib
natpem
peyrim
rispaw
stiwin
tubiv
vopec
yapib
ator
botam
crov
difim
firap
glimoc
gricul
hilnim
jolib
kepwin
Unit 3
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Memory properties
 Law of Frequency:
 We tend to remember things we
experience the most often, rather than
those we experience only once in a while.
You are much more likely to remember
your name or your phone number than
the square root of 3 (unless you are a
mathematician).
Unit 3
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Short Term Memory Test
 Directions
 You are about do a small short term memory






test. A few letters will flash on your computer
monitor for 3 seconds. Your job is to write
down as many letters as you can remember
after they disappear.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
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U M
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T Z L D
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K X C E J O
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A V C Y I S E H
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L B F Q R P M A U X
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Z Q ETC BUM ON RV
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STM exercise
 How did you do? Compare your results
with the table on your page. How
many letters from each trial did you
remember? Is there a "pattern" to
the letters that you remembered?
For example, did you remember the
first few letters better than the
middle letters? Did you remember
the last letters?
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STM exercise
Trial #letters Total letters
1
2
UM
2
3
4
5
6
4
6
8
10
12
TZLD
KXCEJO
AVCYISEH
LBFQRPMAUX
ZQETCBUMONRV
Unit 3
Your #
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Short Term Memory Test - Pictures
 Draw a 4x4 grid of boxes.
 Look at the objects that you should
remember. The objects will stay on
your screen for 30 seconds. Then
write down the names of all the items
you remember inside the appropriate
boxes.
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Here are the pictures . . .
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Picture test
How many objects did you remember?
 Were the objects that you
remembered also placed correctly on
the grid?
 What categories of objects did you
remember: animals, food, building,
animated objects, piano
Unit 3
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Interference: The Stroop Effect
Don't read the
words on the
right--just
say the colors
they're printed in,
and do this aloud
as fast as you
can.You're in for a
surprise!
Unit 3
red
yellow
green
blue
red
blue
yellow
green
blue
red
65
The famous "Stroop Effect" is named after J.
Ridley Stroop who discovered this strange
phenomenon in the 1930’s.
 If you're like most people, your first inclination
was to read the words, 'red, yellow, green...,'
rather than the colors they're printed in, 'blue,
green, red...'
 You've just experienced interference.
 When you look at one of the words, you see both
its color and its meaning. If those two pieces of
evidence are in conflict, you have to make a
choice. Because experience has taught you that
word meaning is more important than ink color,
interference occurs when you try to pay
attention only to the ink color.
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Forgetting: Gone, or Inaccessible?
 Do
we forget because the information
is gone, or do we forget because we
can't access information that is still
there?
 It is difficult to distinguish the two.
However, there is evidence that we
retain more than we can retrieve.
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How to Improve Your Memory
 There are many things you can do
to improve your memory, among
them the use of certain mental
techniques, as well as special care
with nutrition and medicines.
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To stimulate memory
 Use your memory to the utmost.
Challenge a novelty. Learn new skills. If
you work in an office, learn to dance. If
you are a dancer, learn to deal with a
computer; if you work with sales, learn
to play chess; if you are a programmer,
learn to paint. This could stimulate your
brain's neural circuits to grow.
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Pay attention
 Don't try to memorize all the facts that
happen, but focus your attention and
concentrate in what you consider more
important, avoiding all other thoughts.
Exercise: take any object, such as a
pen, and concentrate on it. Think on its
various characteristics: its material, its
function, its color, its anatomy, etc.
Don't allow any other thought to occupy
your mind while you are concentrating on
that pen.
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Relax
 It is impossible to pay attention if
you are tense or nervous. Exercise:
hold your breath for ten seconds,
then release it slowly.
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Associate facts to images
 Learn mnemonic techniques. They
are a very efficient way to
memorize large quantities of
information.
 Visualize images: See figures with
the "eyes of your mind".
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Foods
 Some vitamins are essential for the
proper working of memory: thiamin,
folic acid, and B12 vitamin found in
bread and cereal, vegetables and
fruits.
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Water
 Water helps maintain the memory
systems working, specially in older
persons. According to Doctor
Turkington, lack of water in the
body has an immediate and deep
effect on memory; dehydration can
generate confusion and other
thought difficulties.
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Sleep
 To be able to have a good memory, it is
essential that we allow the brain to have
enough sleep and rest. While sleeping,
the brain disconnects from the senses,
and proceeds to revising and storing
memory. Insomnia would produce a
chronic fatigue and would impair the
ability of concentration and the storing
of information.
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Medication
 Some medicines can cause loss of
memory: tranquilizers, muscular
relaxants, sleeping pills, and antianxiety drugs, such as valium. Some
medicine for the control of high
blood pressure (hypertension) may
cause memory problems and
depression.
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Alcohol
 Alcohol interferes specially with
short-term memory, which impairs
the ability of retaining new
information. Studies have shown
that even the ingestion of low
quantities of alcoholic beverage
during one whole week will interfere
with the ability of remembering.
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Smoking
 Studies have shown that, when
compared with non-smokers,
individual smokers of one or more
packs of cigarettes a day had
difficulties remembering people's
faces and names in a test of visual
and verbal memory (Turkington,
1996).
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Caffeine
 Coffee and tea have a very positive
effect to maintain attention and to
end sleepiness, but the excitation
promoted by these drinks may
interfere with the memory function.
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Practice
 Practice improves memory, but how you
practice also affects it. The same amounts
of practice, but distributed in the one
case and massed in the other, lead to
different outcomes.



Distributed practice is when practice is spread out over
time. For example, you may study a total of 12 hours for
a test but you did so over 6 days.
Massed practice is when practice is done all at once. For
example, you study 12 hours the night before the test.
Many studies have confirmed that the first strategy is
the better one. Subjects remember more and for longer
periods of time when they distribute their practice.
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Over-learning
 Over-learning is when practice is continued
beyond the criterion of one error-free
trial. Actors over-learn their lines. They
will rehearse far beyond the time
necessary for the criterion above. In the
military, drills constitute over-learning. In
all of the cases above, over-learning helps
to negate the negative effects of stress on
memory. Over-learned items can be
recalled under higher levels of stress than
can items that were not over-learned.
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How many of these associations
do you recall now?
 mouse
 fur
 train
 moat
 popcorn
 elephant
 toothbrush
 umbrella
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In conclusion . . .
For the most part, memory does a
magnificent job for us. Every time you
spell a word, drive a car or pick up a
telephone and recognize your mother's
voice, it's a wonder.
Quiz preparation
 Date: October 6
 Length: 40-60 min.
 Points: 50 total
 Content:
 definition
of terms (2 pts. each)
 short essay answers (3-10 pts. each)
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Expectations for the quiz:
Definition of terms plus the following essay topics:

Why is literal translation or interpreting usually
meaningless?

Why should the interpreter speak in the first
person (“I”) while interpreting?

What are the roles of the interpreter?

Define culture and explain why the interpreter
should be knowledgeable of both cultures.

Contrast and/or compare translating and
interpreting in 4 ways.

What knowledge, skills and qualities does a
competent interpreter need to have?

Explain the phenomenon of transference in the
interview.
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Assignments due on
10/6/04
Quiz (50 pts)
Write one thought question for
each article from the text:



Codes
Rules
NAJIT
pp. 1-4, 5-13
pp. 257-263
pp. 264-266
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Until next Wednesday . . .
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