A collisional radiative model based on the spin-orbit-split-arrays was developed and used to determine the charge state distributions. The atomic structure code of Cowan and the spin-orbit-split-arrays model is used to calculate all the emission spectra of the different gold species, and a non-local thermodynamic eguilibrium model is coupled to calculate the ion populations and the charge state distributions at a given density and temperature. The relationship between average charge state and the electron temperature is given.In general, the avera ge charge state increases with electron temperature, except between 3800 and 390 0 eV. The reason for this unusual region is that the ionization potential increa ses much sharply between Au51 and Au52.