Translators’ Perceptions and Edit Traces: Quality of MT as a Tool in Canadian Parliamentary Translation

Translators’ Perceptions and Edit Traces: Quality of MT as a Tool in Canadian Parliamentary Translation

[Jeniffer Leal-Wyss](/people/jeniffer-leal-wyss/unverified/),
[Gabriel Bernier-Colborne](/people/gabriel-bernier-colborne/unverified/),
[Delaney Lothian](/people/delaney-lothian/unverified/),
[Michel Simard](/people/michel-simard/),
[Rebecca Knowles](/people/rebecca-knowles/)

Abstract

The Parliament of Canada’s translation workflow includes access to a specialized neural machine translation (NMT) system. This study analyzes post-editing (PE) activity to identify the types of edits translators make when interacting with the NMT system, as well as the frequency, nature, and severity of errors encountered. We compare translations produced with and without the use of this NMT system to evaluate potential differences in edit patterns. To complement this analysis, we draw on insights from a user study. Our findings explore how translators’ perceptions align with observed PE patterns and how their feedback can inform strategies to better understand, and possibly mitigate, some of the errors observed.- Anthology ID:

- 2026.amta-research.10
- Volume:
[Proceedings of the 17th Conference of the Association for Machine Translation in the Americas (Volume 1: Research Track)](/volumes/2026.amta-research/)- Month:

• August
• Year:
• 2026
• Address:
• Québec City, Canada

- Editors:
[Eleftheria Briakou](/people/eleftheria-briakou/unverified/),[Jeremy Gwinnup](/people/jeremy-gwinnup/),[Shivali Goel](/people/shivali-goel/unverified/)- Venue:
[AMTA](/venues/amta/)- SIG:
- Publisher:

• Association for Machine Translation in the Americas

- Note:
- Pages:

• 159–173

- Language:
- URL:
[https://aclanthology.org/2026.amta-research.10/](https://aclanthology.org/2026.amta-research.10/)- DOI:
- Cite (ACL):

• Jeniffer Leal-Wyss, Gabriel Bernier-Colborne, Delaney Lothian, Michel Simard, and Rebecca Knowles. 2026. Translators’ Perceptions and Edit Traces: Quality of MT as a Tool in Canadian Parliamentary Translation. InProceedings of the 17th Conference of the Association for Machine Translation in the Americas (Volume 1: Research Track), pages 159–173, Québec City, Canada. Association for Machine Translation in the Americas. - Cite (Informal):

[Translators’ Perceptions and Edit Traces: Quality of MT as a Tool in Canadian Parliamentary Translation](https://aclanthology.org/2026.amta-research.10/)(Leal-Wyss et al., AMTA 2026)- PDF:
[https://aclanthology.org/2026.amta-research.10.pdf](https://aclanthology.org/2026.amta-research.10.pdf)