Effects of formal training in translation on working memory, executive functions and language aptitude

The present study investigated the effects of formal training in translation on language aptitude (LA), working memory (WM), attention control (AC) and type of linguistic knowledge. The participants were 365 undergraduate students from Translation Studies (TS), Foreign Language Education (FLE) and Political Science (PS) departments. LA was measured through LLAMA test battery (Meara 2005). Executive Functions (EF) were measured by WM tasks including Operation Span (OSpan) and Symmetry Span (SymSpan) and AC including Flanker Squared, Simon Squared and Stroop Squared tasks. A timed grammaticality judgment test (TGJT), an untimed grammaticality judgment test (UGJT) and metalinguistic knowledge test (MKT) were administered. Results suggest that formal training in translation affects implicit learning and phonological processing (LLAMA D) and memory for novel sound-symbol associations (LLAMA E). The findings also suggest that TS students showed superior performance in metalinguistic knowledge. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) with Promax rotation revealed a three-factor solution. The cluster of the first component reflects a shared dimension of executive working memory (EWM) with high loadings from LLAMA F, SymSpan, Ospan, LLAMA B, LLAMA E and Simon. Second component captures explicit and rule-based language dimension with very high loadings from metalinguistic knowledge and explicit knowledge (composite score). The third component reflects the inhibitory control construct with loadings from Flanker, Stroop, LLAMA D and Simon with a small degree of loading.