Researchers who use TalkBank or CHILDES data and programs are asked to abide by these rules:

• The use of TalkBank data is governed by the Gnu Public License (GPL).
• You should read and follow the TalkBank Code of Ethics.
• You should become a member of the TalkBank system by contacting Brian MacWhinney (macw@cmu.edu) and sending him your academic affiliation, postal address, and email address. Also, please describe how you plan to use the data and whether you will eventually be able to make your own contribution to the database.
• We maintain separate membership lists and datasets by interest groups. So, when joining, please select your major area of interest from these options:
  • CHILDES-- child language acquisition
  • LIDES-- bilingualism and code-switching
  • Gesture
  • AphasiaBank
  • Linguistic Exploration
  • Text and Discourse, including Conversation Analysis
  • Classroom Discourse
  • Animal Communication
• If at all possible, we would like to encourage you to subscribe to one or more of the TalkBank GoogleGroups mailing lists. You can find information on how to subscribe here.
• All articles using TalkBank or CHILDES corpora should cite the references for those corpora as listed in the documentation. This is crucial!
• In addition, articles based on the use of the CHILDES database should cite: MacWhinney, B. (2000). The CHILDES project: Tools for analyzing talk. Third Edition. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
• Please read the relevant sections of the manual for the data you use. These sections describe important aspects of the data that may impact on conclusions based on them.
• If you collect new corpora, please contribute them to TalkBank or CHILDES and urge your colleagues to contribute new corpora. This is key to the growth of the database.
• Faculty members who abide by the above rules are welcome to use the programs and the non-password-protected database freely in their classes and teaching. The programs and data can be freely installed on university computer systems for free use by students, as long as the responsible faculty person is a member of the CHILDES or TalkBank user groups. However, TalkBank or CHILDES files that are password protected cannot be used without explicit permission from the contributor. Also, because they were student projects, the files in the /Conversation/CMU directory can be used for teaching purposes, but not for research purposes.