Cognitive Analysis of Long-Term Memory in Interpreting

Abstract

With the development of the interpretation theory, the studies on interpreting have become extremely important. In view of the importance of memory in interpretation, many scholars concentrate on short-term memory research, while ignoring the important role of long-term memory in interpretation study and practice. In this paper, the author applies the findings of cognitive psychology to probe into the strategies to improve the interpreter's long-term memory. From the perspective of cognitive psychology, interpretation is a systematic, strategic information processing process. This paper first introduces three memory systems and their characteristics, functions operations and interrelations. Then, the author analyzes the significance of long-term memory in particular, and then elaborates factors affecting long-term memory in a cognitive way. Based on this, the author proposes strategies to improve long-term memory. Finally, the author concludes that the use of these strategies can reduce the workload of restructuring, prevent mother tongue's negative transfer, reduce the pressure of language encoding and produce more accurate and fluent target language.