SALT Transcription Rules
1. Transcript Format
Each entry begins with one of the following symbols. If an entry is longer than one line, continue it on the next line.
$ - Identifies the speakers in the transcript; always the first line of the transcript.
Example: $ Child, Examiner
C - Child/Client utterance.
The actual character used depends on the $ speaker line.
E - Examiner utterance.
The actual character used depends on the $ speaker line.
+ - Header information.
Example: + CA: 5;7
- - Time marker.
Example of two-minute marker: - 2:00
: - Pause between utterances of different speakers.
Example of five-second pause: : :05 or :05
; - Pause between utterances of same speaker.
Example of three-second pause: ; :03 or ;03
= - Comment line.
Used for transcriber comments and is not analyzed.
2. End of Utterance Punctuation
Every utterance must end with one of these six punctuation symbols:
. - Statement, comment.
Do not use a period for abbreviations.
! - Surprise, exclamation.
? - Question.
~ - Intonation prompt.
Example: E And then you have to~
^ - Interrupted utterance.
The speaker is interrupted and does not complete the thought/utterance.
> - Abandoned utterance.
The speaker does not complete the thought/utterance but has not been interrupted.
3. Comments within an Utterance
Use curly braces for comments within an utterance.
Example: C Lookit C points to box.
Nonverbal utterances with communicative intent are placed in braces. Example: C nods.
4. Unintelligible Segments
X is used to mark unintelligible sections of an utterance:
X - for an unintelligible word
XX - for an unintelligible segment of unspecified length
XXX - for an unintelligible utterance
Example 1: C They went X X park.
Example 2: C He XX today.
Example 3: C XXX.
5. Bound Morphemes
Words which contain a slash “/” indicate that the word is inflected or contracted in a regular manner. The root word is entered in its base spelling followed by a slash “/” and then the bound morpheme.
English and Spanish
/S - Plural
Examples: kitten/s, baby/s, rana/s, flor/s
Do not mark words that end in “s” but represent one entity (e.g., pants, binoculars).
Do not mark irregular forms (e.g., mice, geese, deer) or when the sound of the root changes (e.g., leaves, wolves).
English only
/Z - Possessive inflection
Examples: dad/z, Mary/z
Do not mark any possessive pronouns (e.g., mine, his, hers, ours, yours, its, theirs).
/S/Z - Plural and Possessive
Example: baby/s/z
/3S - 3rd Person Singular verb form
Examples: go/3s, tell/3s, try/3s
Do not mark irregular forms (e.g., has, was) or when the sound of the root changes (e.g., dodoes, saysays).
/ED - Past tense
Examples: love/ed, die/ed
Do not mark irregular forms (e.g., did, grew, had, sank) or predicate adjectives (e.g., was tired, are bored, got fixed).
/EN - Past participle
Examples: take/en, eat/en, prove/en
Do not mark irregular forms (e.g., gotten, spoken, seen, been) or adjectives (e.g., was eaten, were taken).
/ING - Progressive verb form
Examples: go/ing, run/ing, bike/ing
Do not mark the gerund use of the verb form (e.g., went swimming, reading is fun).
6. Mazes
Filled pauses, false starts, repetitions, and reformulations are surrounded by parentheses ( ).
Combine adjacent mazes.
Example: C And (then um) then (h*) he left.
7. Omissions
Partial words, omitted words, omitted bound morphemes, and omitted pronominal clitics are denoted by an asterisk (*).
* following letters
Indicates that a word was started but left unfinished.
Example: C I (w* w*) want it.
* preceding a word
Indicates that an obligatory word was omitted.
Example: C Give it *to me.
/* following a slash
The * is followed by the obligatory bound morpheme which was omitted.
Example: C The car go/*3s fast.
8. Overlapping Speech
When two speakers are speaking at the same time, the words which occur at the same time are surrounded by angle brackets < >.
Example: C Can I have that <one>?
E <Uhhuh>.
When one speaker interjects in the middle of another speaker's utterance, use empty angle brackets to indicate the position of the interjection.
Example: C I want you to do it < > for me.
E <Ok>.
9. Linked Words
The underscore “_” is used to link multiple words so they are treated as a single word.
Uses include:
Titles of movies and books: Beauty_and_the_Beast, Frog_Where_Are_You
Proper names: Mrs_Jones, Sr_Rojas
Words or phrases repeated multiple times: He ran ran_ran|ran as fast as he could.
10. Root Identification
The vertical bar “|” is used to identify the root word.
Overgeneralization errors:
Example: C He goed|go[EO:went] to the park by himself.
Linked words repeated for emphasis:
Example: C The boy ran very very_very|very fast.
11. Sound Effects and Idiosyncratic Forms
The percent sign % is used to identify sound effects which are essential to the meaning or structure of the utterance.
Non-essential sound effects are entered as comments. Strings of the same sound are linked together.
Example 1: C The dog went %woof_woof.
Example 2: C The dog barked woof woof.
The percent sign is also used to identify idiosyncratic forms. These are immature productions which are consistent in reference to an object, person, or situation.
Example 1: C See %vroom car.
Example 2: C My %coopa cookie.
12. Codes
Codes are used to mark words or utterances. Codes are placed in brackets [ ] and cannot contain blank spaces.
Codes used to mark errors in the reference database samples:
[EO:__] used to mark overgeneralization errors. C He falled|fall[EO:fell].
[EP:__] used to mark pronoun errors. C And them[EP:they] found the frog.
[EW:__] used to mark other word-level errors. C He were[EW:was] look/ing.
[EW] used to mark extraneous words. C And then the boy is a[EW] sleep/ing.
[EU] used to mark utterance-level errors. C And they came to stop/ed [EU].
13. Spelling Conventions
Abbreviations: Periods are not legal word characters. Abbreviated words should either be written out or left as an abbreviation but without the period.
Examples: Mr, Mister, Mrs, Dr, Sra, Señora
Filled pause words:
AH, EH, ER, HM, HMM, UH, UM, MM, and any word with the code [FP]
Yes words:
OK, AHA, MHM, UHHUH (English & Spanish)
YEAH, YEP, YES (English only)
SÍ (Spanish only)
No words:
NO, AHAH, MHMH, UHUH (English & Spanish)
NAH, NOPE (English only)