faccina

English translation: face, face outline, little face

GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)

Italian term or phrase:	faccina
English translation:	face, face outline, little face
Entered by:	Joseph Tein

03:39 Dec 25, 2010

Italian to English translations [PRO]
Social Sciences - Psychology / pain testing

Italian term or phrase: faccina

I'm working on a back translation of a test that measures the pain a person feels by having him/her point to a drawing of a face, in a series of faces that show different levels of pain.

"Queste faccine fanno vedere quanto male hanno" is one sentence, also "Fammi vedere col dito la faccina che ha male come te"

I'm not sure whether I can simply back-translate "faccina" as "face" or "little face" ... or whether "faccina" has some other more specific meaning in Italian. When I look this up online, it seems that "faccina" is used to refer to drawings of faces, or maybe emoticons, but not a real living human face. I don't find it in my bilingual dictionaries or in any of the online dictionaries that I use.

What is the meaning of "faccina"?

Joseph Tein KudoZ activity Questions: 1487 (7 open) (1 without valid answers) (120 closed without grading) Answers: 724 United States
Local time: 02:35

face outline, face

Explanation:
I don't see why face wouldn't work on its own, but you might prefer to say a "drawing of a face" or an "outline of a face". The diminutive in Italian simply refers to the scale, much smaller than life size - so if that is important, you might say "little faces", but I think it would be OK without.

Selected response from:

Shera Lyn Parpia
Italy
Local time: 11:35

Grading comment

Ciao Shera Lyn, and thanks again for your help. I chose "face" for my translation as the most direct term for this situation, although in a different context some of the other suggestions might fit better.
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer

Summary of answers provided

3 +6

face outline, face

Shera Lyn Parpia

3 +1

small face, little face

Gad Kohenov

little face

Lorella Bernardo

smiley face

Kelly Gill

emoticon/smiley

Lucrezia Amedeo

Summary of reference entries provided

More on <b>Pain Face Scales</b>

Barbara Carrara

Discussion entries: 2

Answers

22 mins confidence:

peer agreement (net): +6

face outline, face

Shera Lyn Parpia
Italy
Local time: 11:35
Works in field
Native speaker of:

English
PRO pts in category: 16

Grading comment

1 hr confidence:

peer agreement (net): +1

small face, little face

Explanation:
faccìna
nf

1 small face, little face

From the Hoepli dictionary.

Gad Kohenov
Israel
Local time: 12:35
Works in field
Native speaker of:

French,

Hebrew
PRO pts in category: 16

3 hrs confidence:

little face

Explanation:
"Faccina" literally means "little face" but it can have - as in this case - a tender shade. To me it seems like the text is referring to a kid (just to explain the sensation I have reading that "faccina" in context). "Emoticon" won't be appropriate because I don't think it shares the same feeling. Eeven if is not just a matter of shape and size, I think "little face" would be the best answer.

Lorella Bernardo
Italy
Local time: 11:35
Native speaker of:

Italian

1 day 3 hrs confidence:

smiley face

Explanation:
I think it would be natural to say "smiley face" even if the faces aren't actually all smiling.

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 1 day3 hrs (2010-12-26 07:03:58 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

http://www.salem-news.com/articles/february012010/purdue_lat...

Kelly Gill
Italy
Local time: 11:35
Native speaker of:

English

1 day 8 hrs confidence:

emoticon/smiley

Explanation:
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoticon

Lucrezia Amedeo
Italy
Local time: 11:35
Native speaker of:

Italian

Reference comments

4 hrs peer agreement (net): +2

Reference: More on <b>Pain Face Scales</b>

Reference information:
'Description
Facial expression may be the most consistent across-infant indicator of pain. The first aim of the study is to "develop a simple measure of the intensity of pain, to be used with children including those in the late pre-logical Piagetian stage of cognitive development before 7 years." The second focus is to "pay particular attention to the scale properties of the set of faces." "Children were given a black pencil and 5 sheets of paper with oval outlires within which to draw" faces showing various degrees of pain. There are five phases in which the drawings are measured for severity of pain.'
(http://www.psychwiki.com/wiki/Faces_Pain_Scale)

"Explain to the person that each face is for a person who feels happy because he has no pain (no hurt) or sad because he has some or a lot of pain. Face 0 is very happy because he doesn’t hurt at all. Face 1 hurts just a little bit. Face 2 hurts a little more. Face 3 hurts even more. Face 4 hurts a whole lot. Face 5 hurts as much as you can imagine, although you don’t have to be crying to feel this bad. Ask the person to choose the face that best describes how he is feeling.
Rating scale is recommended for persons age 3 years and older."
(www.partnersagainstpain.com/printouts/A7012AS6.pdf)

As you can see, non diminutive is used in English when describing the drawings.

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 4 hrs (2010-12-25 08:17:23 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Guess the Italian translation chose 'faccina' as closer to both the style of the drawings and to children's language.

Take a look at this excerpt from an Italian web source
Quest’anno, invece, il Ministero e gli altri enti organizzatori, hanno deciso di “puntare” più specificamente sul personale sanitario, ospedaliero e territoriale, al quale verrà inviato materiale per sensibilizzare ad una rilevazione sistematica del dolore. In particolare, giungeranno ai medici e agli infermieri di tutta Italia, un righello con la Scala Numerica di valutazione ed uno con la Scala “a faccine”, per la rilevazione del dolore nei bambini, con un depliant di accompagnamento e di spiegazione. La rilevazione deve essere registrata nella cartella clinica del malato, insieme agli altri segni di monitoraggio delle funzioni vitali."
(http://www.saluter.it/news/ausl-fo/dolore-un-righello-da-zer...

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 4 days (2010-12-29 09:41:04 GMT) Post-grading
--------------------------------------------------

Thank you, Joseph, and a very successful 2011!

Barbara Carrara
Italy
Native speaker of:

Italian

Note to reference poster

Asker: Ciao Barbara. Thank you very much for the reference information.

Login or register (free and only takes a few minutes) to participate in this question.

You will also have access to many other tools and opportunities designed for those who have language-related jobs (or are passionate about them). Participation is free and the site has a strict confidentiality policy.

Return to KudoZ list

KudoZ™ translation help

The KudoZ network provides a framework for translators and others to assist each other with translations or explanations of terms and short phrases.

See also:

ProZ.com term search

Search millions of term translations

faccina

English translation: face, face outline, little face

Answers

Reference comments

KudoZ™ translation help

Your current localization setting

Select a language

faccina

English translation: face, face outline, little face

Answers

Reference comments

KudoZ™ translation help

You have native languages that can be verified

Your current localization setting

Select a language