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You should mark omissions because they may be an indication of utterance formulation problems. An omission occurs when a word or bound morpheme that is obligatory for grammatical correctness is absent. For example, if the child says, "His name Larry", the copula "is" should be marked as an omission. On the other hand, if a speaker asks, "What are you doing?" and the child responds "Eating", there isn't an omission because no obligatory content has been left out. Omitted words and bound morphemes are not included in calculations such as "mean length of utterance", "number of different words", or "words per minute".
Omitted Words
The asterisk symbol (*) is used to indicate an omitted word. At the point in the transcript where the word was omitted, type an asterisk followed by the omitted word. There should be no blank spaces between the asterisk and the omitted word. For example,
WHAT WAS SAID
What is this?
This a cookie.
Do you want to eat it?
I want eat it. |
TRANSCRIPTION
E What is this?
C This *is a cookie.
E Do you want to eat it?
C I want *to eat it. |
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Omitted Bound Morphemes
A slash followed by an asterisk is used to indicate the omission of a bound morpheme in obligatory context. Type the slash, the asterisk, and the missing bound morphemes at the point in the transcript where they've been omitted. For example,
WHAT WAS SAID
Where does the boy go?
The boy go here.
Then what happened?
The frog jump off. |
TRANSCRIPTION
E Where does the boy go?
C The boy go/*3s here.
E Then what happen/ed?
C The frog jump/*ed off. |
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Omitted Contractions: Words vs Bound Morphemes
Omitted contractions may be transcribed in two ways, as an omission of a word or as an omission of a bound morpheme. It doesn't make much difference which way you mark this type of omission since omissions are not included in any of the calculations based on words or morphemes. The important thing is to mark that the omission occurred. For example,
WHAT WAS SAID
He going home.
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TRANSCRIPTION
C He *is go/ing home.
OR
C He/*'s going home. |
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Omitted Something - Not Sure What
Sometimes it is impossible to determine the specific words or bound morphemes that are missing. If you know what part of speech is missing you can mark the omissions like this:
WHAT WAS SAID
And then went home.
And he the frog.
He laughing and laughing.
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TRANSCRIPTION
C And then *SUBJ went home.
C And he *VERB the frog.
C He *AUX laugh/ing and laugh/ing. |
If you are unable to determine what part of speech is missing, flag the utterance with the error code [EU] to indicate that there is something wrong with this utterance. The [EU] code indicates an utterance-level error. Coded utterances can be counted and called up later for further analysis.
WHAT WAS SAID
What is Sammy doing?
He book.
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TRANSCRIPTION
E What is Sammy do/ing?
C He book [EU]. |
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