http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0048-993X
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ABSTRACT
The typically recommended maximum number of lines in a subtitle is two. Yet, three-line subtitles are often used in intralingual English-to-English subtitling on television programmes with high information density and fast speech rates. To the best of our knowledge, no prior empirical work has contrasted the processing of three-line with two-line subtitles. In this study, we showed participants one video with two-line subtitles and one with three-line subtitles. We measured the impact of the number of lines on subtitle processing using eye tracking as well as comprehension, cognitive load, enjoyment and preferences. We conducted two experiments with different types of viewers: hearing native speakers of English, Polish and Spanish as well as British hard of hearing and deaf viewers. Three-line subtitles induced higher cognitive load than two-line subtitles. The number of lines did not affect comprehension. Viewers generally preferred two-line over three-line subtitles. The results provide empirical evidence on the processing of two- and three-line subtitles and can be used to inform current subtitling practices.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors
Agnieszka Szarkowska is currently Research Fellow at the Centre for Translation Studies, University College London (2016-2018), working on the project ‘Exploring Subtitle Reading with Eye Tracking Technology’. Since 2007, she has also been Assistant Professor in the Institute of Applied Linguistics, University of Warsaw. She is the founder and head of the Audiovisual Translation Lab (AVT Lab, www.avt.ils.uw.edu.pl) and specializes in audiovisual translation, especially subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing and audio description. She is a member of European Association for Studies in Screen Translation (ESIST), European Society for Translation Studies (EST) and an honorary member of the Polish Audiovisual Translators Association (STAW).
Olivia Gerber-Morón holds a Bachelor of Arts in Multilingual Communication and a Master of Arts in Specialized Translation from the University of Geneva, and a Master of Arts in Audiovisual Translation from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB). She is part of the TransMedia Catalonia Research Group and has collaborated with the HBB4ALL European project as the subtitle work package leader for UAB user tests. The ‘la Caixa’ Foundation has awarded her a PhD grant. Her research areas of interest in Audiovisual Translation are subtitling, subtitling for the deaf and hard of hearing, and respeaking. Her PhD research focuses on defining the quality of line breaks across the different platforms and screens in order to create guidelines and standards to regulate subtitle segmentation for translators, broadcasters and other interested entities in the audiovisual industry.
ORCID
Agnieszka Szarkowska http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0048-993X
Olivia Gerber-Morón http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6513-3662
Notes
1 In this paper we follow the European convention and use the term ‘subtitling’ as opposed to ‘captioning’ to denote both intra- and interlingual transfer. We retain the term ‘captions’ in citations only.
2 Reversed subtitles contain text in a foreign language accompanying a programme in the soundtrack in viewers’ mother tongue, for instance English subtitles to a Polish programme for Polish viewers.
3 We are well aware of the problematic nature of using self-reports to asses one’s own level of proficiency in a foreign language. Yet, owing to the time limitations and the nature of the study, it was not possible for us to test participants’ language proficiency directly. Participants were given a sheet (Szarkowska & Gerber-Morón, Citation2018a) describing the skills required at each proficiency level using the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. They made their assessment based on the sheet as well as their own experience with the European system which they were familiar with from their education in schools and at university.
4 For example, if a subtitle lasted for 3 s and the participant spent 2.5 s in that subtitle, the percentage dwell time was 2500/3000 ms = 83%, i.e. while the subtitle was displayed for 3 s, the participant was looking at that subtitle for 83% of the time.
