From Talk to Text SOCL 3633 Research Methods · Lab 10 · Midwestern State University

Today you turn 10 minutes of your interview into a written transcript. Transcribing is not only typing. Each choice about what to keep shapes what you can find when you analyze the interview in Lab 11. Work through the tabs in order. Submit your transcript file and your response sheet in the Lab 10 submission on D2L by Monday, April 5, at 11:59 p.m.

Keep this page open while you work. Your entries are not saved anywhere. If you close or reload the page, they are lost.

Get set up

Have your interview recording on your phone and your headphones connected.
Open a new Word document (or a Google Doc) and save it as lastname_lab10_transcript in your campus storage.
At the top of the document, type: the date of the interview, its total length, where it took place (for example, "a coffee shop" or "a video call"), and a general description of the respondent with no name (for example, "a man in his 50s who worked in a warehouse").
Have your interview notes in front of you.

Transcribe by hand. Do not upload your recording to an AI transcription tool or any other website. Your consent text told your respondent that only you and your instructor would see what you type up, and that you would keep the recording yourself. Sending it to an outside service would break that promise.

If your interview fell through, tell your instructor now. You will interview a classmate on the same topic for 15 minutes during class, record it, and transcribe that instead.

The conventions

Use exactly these conventions, so that everyone's transcripts can be read and coded the same way in Lab 11.

What happens	What you type
Each turn of talk	`I:` for you (the interviewer) and `R:` for the respondent, at the start of each turn
A noticeable pause	`(.)`
A long pause	The length in seconds, such as `(3s)`
Sounds that are not words	In square brackets: `[laughs]`, `[sighs]`, `[phone buzzes]`
Words you cannot make out	`(inaudible)`. Do not guess silently.
"Um," "like," "you know," false starts, and self-corrections	Type them all. Do not clean up the talk.
Any real name of a person, employer, or place that could identify someone	A label in square brackets: `[name]`, `[manager]`, `[employer]`, `[town]`

An example

I: So what was your first week like? R: Um, it was, [laughs] it was a lot. Like, I didn't, I didn't know anybody, and my, uh, my manager, [name], she just kind of (.) threw me on register. I: Mm-hm. R: And I was like, okay. (3s) I mean, I figured it out.

Practice: what was lost?

Someone transcribed the same exchange but cleaned it up. Compare the two versions. For each item, decide whether the cleaned version made that change.

Word for word

I: So what was your first week like? R: Um, it was, [laughs] it was a lot. Like, I didn't, I didn't know anybody, and my, uh, my manager, Tasha, she just kind of (.) threw me on register. I: Mm-hm. R: And I was like, okay. (3s) I mean, I figured it out.

Cleaned up

R: My first week was a lot. I didn't know anybody, and my manager, Tasha, put me on the register right away. I figured it out.

0 of 7 items decided.

Transcribe

Choose the 10 minutes of your recording that tell you the most about the respondent's job. This is often not the first 10 minutes. Write down the start and end times.
Start the timer below, then transcribe those 10 minutes word for word, with your own questions included. Play a few seconds, pause, type, and replay as often as you need.
Stop the timer when you finish, or when class ends. If you finish at home, start it again there.

Transcription timer

0:00

The time fills in question 5 of the response sheet.

Researchers often plan on 3 to 4 minutes of typing for every minute of recording. If you are slow at first, that is normal.

Mark two moments

As you transcribe, put an asterisk (*) at the start of two places in your transcript:

Moment 1: a place where the meaning depends on tone, pace, or laughter, and the words alone do not carry it.
Moment 2: a place where you wanted to correct what the respondent said, and did not.

Checkpoint. Before you go further, check that your first page uses I: and R:, and that every real name is replaced with a label in brackets.

Lab 10 response sheet

Answer in complete sentences. Then assemble your answers and paste them into the Lab 10 submission on D2L. In the same submission, upload your transcript file. Both are due Monday, April 5, at 11:59 p.m.

Your name

1. Which 10 minutes did you choose, and why?

Give the start and end times, and one or two sentences on why.

2. Your first marked moment, where the meaning depends on tone, pace, or laughter: what is lost when it becomes text, and how might a reader of the transcript alone misread it?

Three to four sentences. Quote the line from your transcript.

3. Your second marked moment, where you wanted to correct the quote and did not: why does keeping it as spoken matter for analysis?

Two to three sentences. Quote the line from your transcript.

4. Name one way what your respondent said might differ from what they think. Use this interview: social desirability, deference, or who else was present.

Two to three sentences.

5. How long did it take you to transcribe your 10 minutes?

The timer fills this in. Correct it if you also worked without the timer.

Keep your recording and transcript. You code the transcript in Lab 11 on Thursday, April 8. Delete the recording at the end of the semester, as your consent text promised.

Sources

Bernard, H. Russell, and Amber Wutich. 2026. Social Research Methods: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Chapter 8, "Recording Is Not a Substitute for Taking Notes," and chapter 13, "Transcriptions."
Midwestern State University Institutional Review Board. n.d. "Guidelines for Class Related Projects." https://msutexas.edu/irb/_assets/files/guidelines-for-class-related-projects.pdf

The transcription conventions are a simplified version of common qualitative practice. The practice excerpt was written for this course.