The Monitor Model and its Misconceptions: A Clarification

TL;DR

This paper clarifies the Monitor Model of translation, addressing misconceptions, updating it with new evidence, and aligning it with enactivist cognition to improve understanding of automatic and control processes.

Contribution

It provides a clarified, updated version of the Monitor Model, integrating recent evidence and reconciling it with enactivist cognitive theories.

Findings

The Monitor Model is compatible with enactivist cognition.

Misconceptions about the model are addressed and corrected.

Updated evidence supports the integration of automatic and control processes.

Abstract

Horizontal (automatic) and vertical (control) processes have been observed and reported for a long time in translation production. Schaeffer and Carl's Monitor Model integrates these two processes into one framework, assuming that priming mechanisms underlie horizontal/automatic processes, while vertical/monitoring processes implement consciously accessible control mechanisms. The Monitor Model has been criticized in various ways and several misconceptions have accumulated over the past years. In this chapter, I update the Monitor Model with additional evidence and argue that it is compatible with an enactivist approach to cognition. I address several misconceptions related to the Monitor Model.