Simultaneous interpreting places exceptional cognitive and emotional demands on beginners, who must comprehend, reformulate, and produce speech almost concurrently. In this study, we investigated whether computerized dynamic assessment (CDA) could support learners precisely when these processing difficulties arose.
Using a pretest–intervention–posttest design, we worked with 35 novice English–Chinese simultaneous interpreting learners from two intact classes. Eighteen learners used DynamiSI, a purpose-built platform that evaluated their renditions in real time and delivered four progressively explicit levels of support for five challenging syntactic structures. The comparison group received static, non-graduated assistance. We assessed performance using seven measures of complexity, accuracy, and fluency, alongside a questionnaire measuring interpreting-specific anxiety.
We found that learners receiving CDA made significantly greater gains in syntactic complexity, producing longer and structurally richer clauses. They also became more fluent, with marked reductions in filled pauses and overall disfluencies. Both groups improved in interpreting accuracy, suggesting that the short intervention produced additional benefits primarily for complexity and fluency rather than fidelity. Learners receiving adaptive scaffolding also reported substantially lower anxiety.
Our findings extend computerized dynamic assessment beyond receptive skills and discrete language exercises to complex, real-time oral performance. By providing immediate, individualized, and non-judgmental assistance, DynamiSI helped learners manage both syntactic processing demands and the affective pressures of interpreting. The study offers a scalable model for shifting interpreter education from delayed, product-focused feedback toward adaptive, process-oriented learning.