Perception of ‘broad’ and ‘narrow’ fluency in the EFL performance of student interpreters

Abstract

The oral fluency of non-native speakers is an important measure in evaluating a person’s second language (L2) proficiency. The present study investigates the relationship between the perception of fluency in its broad sense, meaning overall speaking proficiency, and in the narrow sense, in which flow and smoothness as well as grammar and vocabulary are evaluated. An experiment was conducted in which the speech fluency of 25 interpreter trainees was rated by 12 raters – three native experts, three native non-experts, three non-native experts and three non-native non-experts – in the narrow and broad senses, and then again after one month’. The results of the study showed that the raters’ judgements of fluency in the narrow sense were significantly lower than that of broad fluency. The expert raters were significantly less lenient than the non-experts overall, and more so when using the narrow definition of fluency. There was no statistically significant difference found in the scores of the native and non-native raters. It is suggested that interpreter trainees develop both broad and narrow fluency skills through training and practice. This can include improving their linguistic knowledge as well as practicing speaking skills.