CHILDES English Wells Corpus

Gordon Wells Education UC Santa Cruz gwells@ucsc.edu

Browsable transcripts

Download transcripts

Citation information

Wells, C. G. (1981). Learning through interaction: The study of language development. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

In accordance with TalkBank rules, any use of data from this corpus must be accompanied by at least one of the above references.

Project Description

This extensive corpus contains 299 files from 32 British children (16 girls and 16 boys) aged 1;6 to 5;0, recorded in a naturalistic setting. The data are taken from a project by Gordon Wells and colleagues entitled “The Bristol language development study: language development in preschool children” (1973). The original intent of the study was to provide a normative survey of British children growing up in an urban environment. The samples were recorded by tape recorders that turned on for 90-second intervals and then automatically turned off.

Approximately 1000 names were drawn at random from the record of births held by the City Medical Officer, and the families of all these children were approached initially by health visitors and subsequently by members of the research team. Details relevant to the classification of family background were obtained from all families, including a small minority who declined to take part in the study. At the same time, information was obtained that allowed us to exclude a number of categories of children: multiple births, children with known handicaps, those in full-time day care and those whose parents did not speak English as their native language. These categories were excluded, not out of any lack of interest in the problems that such children might be expected to encounter, but because their numbers in a sample of this size could not be expected to be large enough to permit meaningful comparisons to be made with the “normal” population.

Then, finally, names of those children whose families had agreed to take part were picked at random to fill the cells in the sample design, and a number of reserves were picked in a similar manner. During the following 4 years several families withdrew from the study, but when the schedule of recordings was finally completed, the sample still numbered 129 children.

Each child was observed a total of 10 times at three-monthly intervals, each observation consisting of a recording in the child’s home and the administration of a number of tests at the Research Unit in the university. In addition, the parents of each child were interviewed when he or she was aged 3;6, to obtain information about the long-term environment provided by the home and about the parents’ beliefs and practices concerning their role in the upbringing of their children.

The recording of spontaneous occurring conversation was the main part of each observation. The decision was made at the outset to obtain recordings in conditions that reduced to the minimum the possibly distorting effect of the actual observation process. To this end, special equipment was constructed that could be delivered to the child’s home on the day before the observation was to be made and left there to work quite automatically until after the observation was completed. In the morning, when the child was being dressed for the day, a lightweight harness containing a radio microphone was put under the child’s top garment. This transmitted continuously all speech produced by the child and any speech by others that was loud enough for the child to hear. It also, of course, picked up and transmitted a large range of other noises, such as doors shutting, footsteps, and even the bubbles of the goldfish in the aquarium. Because the microphone was linked to the tape recorder by radio, it caused no impediment to the child’s freedom to move around, and reception remained good up to a range of 100 meters.

At the other end of the radio link in an out-of-the-way room or cupboard was a box containing the rest of the equipment: a radio receiver, a tape recorder, and a rather complex timing mechanism that was programmed to record 24 examples of 90 seconds’ duration at approximately 20-minute intervals between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. The intervals between samples were irregular so that parents would not be tempted to plan activities in regular 20-minute cycles. In fact, they were completely unaware of the precise time at which recordings were to be made, and the program was changed for each observation. The result was that, as far as is humanly possible within the limits set by ethical considerations, we recorded samples of these families’ normal spontaneous conversation without their being aware that they were being observed.

There was, of course, a price to be paid. By choosing to give priority to naturalness, we had to forgo the making of on-the-spot notes about the context in which the conversations occurred. To a considerable extent we were able to compensate for this by playing the recording back to the parents in the evening and asking them to recall, in as much detail as possible, the location, participants, and activity for each of the recorded 90-second samples. An experiment carried out to compare this procedure with the more traditional procedure of a researcher being present during the recording revealed little difference in terms of the amount of contextual information that could be recovered; in some cases the mother was able to make more sense of an episode when she listened to it in the evening than the observer had been able to do while it was actually occurring. Once the observation had been made, the recording was transcribed and checked and then each child utterance was analyzed using the framework described earlier.

Table 1: Wells Files

Sample	Age	Sample	Age	Sample	Age
abigai02	1;5.28	geoffr04	2;2.29	nancy08	3;0.6
abigai03	1;8.27	geoffr05	missing	nancy09	3;3.3
abigai04	2;0.1	geoffr06	2;5.29	neil02	1;6.4
abigai05	2;3.0	geoffr07	2;9.4	neil03	1;9.5
abigai06	2;6.2	geoffr08	3;0.12	neil04	1;11.28
abigai07	2;9.3	geoffr09	3;3.9	neil05	2;2.25
abigai08	3;0.2	geoffr10	3;6.11	neil06	2;6.1
abigai09	3;3.0	geoffr21	4;11.22	neil08	3;0.2
abigai10	3;6.6	gerald02	1;6.6	neil09	3;3.1
abigai21	4;8	gerald03	1;8.29	neil10	3;6.1
benjam02	1;5.21	gerald04	2;0.15	nevill02	1;5.25
benjam03	1;8.27	gerald05	2;3.5	nevill03	1;9.15
benjam04	1;11.30	gerald06	2;6.5	nevill04	2;0.7
benjam05	2;3.3	gerald07	2;9.1	nevill05	2;3.0
benjam06	2;5.28	gerald08	2;11.26	nevill06	2;5.21
benjam07	2;9.1	gerald10	3;5.0	nevill07	2;9.0
benjam08	2;11.29	gerald21	4;9.5	nevill08	3;0.1
benjam09	3;2.29	harrie02	1;6.2	nevill09	3;4.12
benjam10	3;6.3	harrie03	1;9.1	nevill10	3;5.27
benjam21	5;0.24	harrie04	2;0.1	olivia02	1;6.0
betty02	1;6.3	harrie05	2;3.2	olivia03	1;9.4
betty03	1;9.4	harrie06	2;6.1	olivia04	1;11.27
betty04	2;0.3	harrie07	2;9.0	olivia05	2;3.5
betty05	2;3.2	harrie08	3;0.0	olivia06	2;5.25
betty06	2;5.28	harrie09	3;3.0	olivia07	2;8.21
betty07	2;8.27	harrie10	3;6.1	olivia08	2;11.26
betty08	3;0.9	harrie21	4;10.3	olivia09	3;3.10
betty09	3;3.2	iris02	1;6.0	olivia10	3;5.22
betty21	4;11.2	iris03	1;8.5	penny02	1;6.9
darren02	1;6.2	iris04	2;0.2	penny03	2;9.5
darren03	1;9.0	iris05	2;2.30	penny04	1;11.27
darren04	2;0.6	iris06	2;3/2;9?	penny05	2;3.0
darren05	2;2.26	iris07	2;9.13	penny06	2;6.0
darren06	2;6.1	iris08	3;0.6	penny07	2;9.18
darren07	2;8.29	iris09	3;2.29	penny08	2;11.27
darren08	3;0.3	iris10	3;5.27	penny09	3;3.7
darren09	3;3.11	iris21	4;8.4	penny10	3;5.26
darren10	3;6.4	jack02	1;5.26	rosie02	1;5.29
darren21	4;10.6	jack03	1;9.4	rosie03	1;9.19
debbie02	1;6.9	jack04	2;0.2	rosie04	2;0.13
debbie03	1;8.30	jack05	2;2.25	rosie05	2;2.27
debbie04	1;11.29	jack06	2;5.13	rosie06	2;6.3
debbie05	2;3.20	jack07	2;9.24	rosie07	2;9.10
debbie06	2;6.6	jack08	2;11.26	rosie08	0;0.3
debbie07	2;9.5	jack09	3;3.8	rosie09	3;3.0
debbie08	3;11.28	jack10	3;5.23	rosie10	3;6.11
debbie09	3;3.4	jack21	4;9.1	samant02	1;6.6
debbie10	3;6.24	jason02	1;6.0	samant03	1;9.7
debbie21	1;11.25?	jason03	1;9.0	samant04	1;11.30
ellen02	1;5.26	jason04	2;0.8	samant05	2;2.29
ellen03	1;9.0	jason05	2;3.1	samant06	2;6.0
ellen04	1;11.29	jason06	2;6.1	samant07	2;9.3
ellen05	2;2.21	jason07	2;9.29	samant08	3;0.4
ellen06	2;5.21	jason08	3;0.2	samant09	3;2.27
ellen07	2;8.30	jason09	3;3.6	samant10	3;6.11
ellen08	2;11.28	jason10	3;5.30	sean02	1;6.11
ellen09	3;3.4	jason21	5;0.19	sean03	1;8.30
ellen10	3;6.1	jonath0	1;6.5	sean04	1;11.29
ellen21	4;9.22	jonath03	1;8.26	sean05	2;2.28
elspet02	1;5.30	jonath04	1;11.29	sean06	2;6.5
elspet03	1;8.23	jonath05	2;2.26	sean07	2;9.4
elspet04	2;0.2	jonath06	2;6.2	sean08	3;0.11
elspet05	2;2.29	jonath07	2;9.1	sean09	3;2.28
elspet06	2;6.6	jonath0	2;11.29	sean10	3;6.9
elspet07	2;8.28	jonath	3;2.28	sheila02	1;11.25?
elspet08	3;0.4	jonath	3;5.24	sheila03	1;9.2
elspet09	3;2.30	jonath	4;7.14	sheila04	1;11.30
elspet10	3;6.5	laura02	1;6.1	sheila05	2;3.4
elspet21	5;0.3	laura03	1;9.7	sheila06	2;5.27
frances02	1;6.1	laura04	2;0.6	sheila07	2;9.0
frances03	1;8.30	laura05	2;4.16	sheila08	2;11.28
frances04	2;0.1	laura06	2;6.3	sheila09	3;3.4
frances05	2;3.2	laura07	2;9.13	sheila10	3;6.25
frances06	2;6.3	laura08	3;0.7	simon02	1;5.21
frances07	2;8.30	laura09	3;3.0	simon03	1;9.2
frances08	2;11.28	laura10	3;6.2	simon04	1;11.13
frances09	3;3.0	lee02	1;5.28	simon05	2;3.5
frances10	3;6.0	lee03	2;2.3	simon06	2;6.0
frances21	4;10.8	lee04	1;11.26	simon07	1;9.1
gary02	1;6.0	lee05	2;3.1	simon08	3;0.1
gary03	1;9.2	lee06	2;6.1	simon09	3;3.9
gary04	2;0.4	lee07	2;9.24	simon10	3;5.22
gary05	2;3.4	lee08	missing	stella02	1;6.8
gary06	2;6.3	lee09	3;3.0	stella03	1;9.3
gary07	2;9.5	lee10	3;5.29	stella05	2;2.30
gary08	3;0.4	martin02	1;5.26	stella06	2;6.2
gary09	3;3.3	martin03	1;9.2	stella07	2;8.25
gary10	3;5.25	martin04	2;0.8	stella08	2;11.27
gary21	4;9.0	martin05	2;3.3	stella09	3;3.7
gavin02	1;6.21	martin06	2;5.26	stella10	3;5.30
gavin03	1;9.4	martin07	2;8.24	tony02	1;5.26
gavin04	1;11.30	martin08	3;0.4	tony03	1;8.26
gavin05	2;4.4	martin09	3;3.5	tony04	1;11.14
gavin07	2;10.5	martin10	3;5.28	tony05	2;3.10
gavin08	3;0.6	nancy02	1;6.2	tony06	2;5.26
gavin09	3;3.19	nancy03	1;9.4	tony07	2;9.2
gavin10	3;7.27	nancy04	2;0.1	tony08	2;11.23
gavin21	4;9.18	nancy05	2;3.12	tony09	3;3.21
geoffr02	1;6.0	nancy06	2;5.27	tony10	3;6.8
geoffr03	1;9.6	nancy07	2;8.25