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Utterances

Status: Reference Last updated: 2026-05-11 23:22 EDT

An utterance is the fundamental unit of a CHAT transcript. It consists of a main tier (the transcribed speech) followed by zero or more dependent tiers (annotations).

Main Tier

The main tier begins with *SPEAKER: followed by a tab and the utterance content, ending with a terminator.

*CHI:	I want a cookie .

Speaker Codes

Speaker codes are short identifiers (up to seven characters from A-Z, 0-9, _, -, '; three uppercase letters is the convention) matching a code declared in @Participants:

@Participants:	CHI Target_Child, MOT Mother
*MOT:	what do you want ?
*CHI:	cookie .

Terminators

Every utterance must end with a terminator:

TerminatorMeaning
.Declarative (period)
?Question
!Exclamation
+...Trailing off
+..?Trailing-off question
+/.Interruption
+//.Self-interruption
+/?Interrupted question
+!?Broken question
+"/.Quotation follows on next line

Line Continuation

Long utterances wrap to the next line with a leading tab:

*MOT:	well I think that we should probably go to
	the store and get some more cookies .

Content Items

The content between *SPEAKER: and the terminator consists of content items separated by whitespace:

  • Words: regular words, potentially with annotations
  • Groups: bracketed content like <word word> for overlap, retrace, etc.
  • Special forms: pauses (.), events &=laughs, fillers &-uh
  • Separators: commas , and other punctuation

Words

Words are the primary content unit. See Word Syntax for full details.

Groups

Angle brackets < > group words for annotations:

*CHI:	<I want> [/] I want cookie .

Common group annotations:

  • [/]: partial retrace (speaker repeats the same words)
  • [//]: full retrace (speaker restarts with different words)
  • [///]: multiple retracing (multiple false starts)
  • [/-]: reformulation (speaker rephrases with different structure)
  • [?]: uncertain transcription

Special Forms

*CHI:	um (.) I want &-uh cookie .
  • (.): short pause
  • (..): medium pause
  • (...): long pause
  • (1.5): timed pause in seconds
  • &=laughs: paralinguistic event
  • &-uh: filler

Media Linking

Utterances can include media timestamps (bullets) that link to audio/video:

*CHI:	I want cookies . •1234_5678•

The numbers represent start and end times in milliseconds. The bullets delimiting the pair render as • in most editors; on disk they are the NAK control character (U+0015). See grammar/grammar.js rule bullet.

Dependent Tiers

See Dependent Tiers for documentation on %mor, %gra, %pho, %wor, and other annotation tiers that follow the main tier.