APA 6th edition periodicals with more than seven authors

ktanner
Hello,

I had a question about generating APA 6th ed. bibliography citations for periodicals that have more than seven authors. The new manual (page 198) changes the citation of periodicals with more than seven authors. Formerly, the first six authors were listed, with the sixth author being followed by et al. For example:

Ohleyer, V., Freddo, M., Bagner, D. M., Simons, L. E., Geffken, G. R., Silverstein, J.
    H., et al. (2007). Disease-related stress in parents of children who are overweight: Relations with parental anxiety and childhood psychosocial functioning. Journal of Child Health Care, 11(2), 132-142.
However, with the new format, the citation should look like this:

Paradise, J. L., Dollaghan, C. A., Campbell, T. F., Feldman, H. M., Bernard, B. S.,
    Colborn, D. K., . . . Smith, C.G. (2003). Otitis media and tympanostomy tube insertion during the first three years of life: Developmental outcomes at the age of four years. Pediatrics, 112(2), 265-277. doi:10.xxx.xxx (This article did not list doi)
There is an ellipsis separating the sixth author from the last author in the series.

You can find a free resource outlining this change here:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/06/
Click on Reference List: Author/Authors

Is there anything that can be done to modify the zotero APA style so that the ellipsis can be added between the sixth and last author in the series of authors instead of "et al"? Also, for journal articles that have seven authors, all seven authors must be spelled out in the reference list. As it is currently (and I tried it with a citation of a journal author with exactly seven authors) it lists the first six followed by et al, like my first citation example above. Is there a fix for that?

I think that Zotero is a magnificent tool, and I appreciate all of your efforts to keep it current with the latest editions of the various citation styles. I would like to help you in any way that I can, although I am not a programmer. Please let me know if there is anything I can do and if there are any solutions to the above problems.

Thanks!
  • adamsmith
    yeah - the elipsis is not currently possible in Zotero (i.e. there is no way to change the style to do this)- I guess it makes sense given current citation practices, where the last author is quite important, maybe we can attract Frank's or Rintze's attention here and see how that is looking in the new csl processor?
    The correct behavior for seven authors is easy, though, I'll do this asap.
  • fbennett
    I've added a ticket for this to the CSL tracker, for consideration after the CSL 1.0 release. We'll see how things go, but I don't think we can guarantee that it will be covered in 1.0.
  • adamsmith
    I've committed the APA change that now lists 7 authors before et al and all 7 authors before for 7 author articles. You'll need to manually re-install the APA 6th edition from the repository.
  • dstillman
    Clarification: You'll need to reinstall the APA style from the Additional Styles section.

    Once I have confirmation that this is working properly, I can push this to clients.
  • adamsmith
    yeah, sorry, should have made that clearer.
  • ktanner
    Thank you all. The forthcoming changes will make my work much easier.

    I do want to note that even listing seven authors before et al. is still not correct APA style. I understand that this is the best that can be done for now, but just so that people out there know that if they are generating a bibliography in the new APA style they can't just generate it and hand it in. It will still need to be carefully edited. I only mention this because in reading through other threads I noticed that some people got reduced scores on their papers due to incorrect APA style, and I only want to save people from that :)

    Perhaps the best solution in the interim would be if there was a CSL script that could remove the et al. (since et al. anywhere in the references is no longer correct, it is only correct within the text citations) and list all of the authors, so I can then remove authors between the sixth and last and replace them with the ellipsis manually. That would save me from flipping between Zotero and my word processor and looking for a last author in sometimes a very long list of authors on sometimes a very long bibliography.

    Since this may not be appropriate for everyone, it may be best to post a script to a forum thread (if possible) and not change the existing style, so that everyone can choose what is right for them (some people not familiar with the new APA style may mistake listing every author on a long list of authors on a paper for correct style).

    I don't mean to be a pain or to sound ungrateful for everyone's prompt attention to the problem. Even if nothing changed until the revision to the CSL I would probably not stop using Zotero. I just wonder if anyone else is having the problem, and if the above suggestion would make it easier.

    Best,
    Katie
  • adamsmith
    I think such a script should be very easy to write - I'll test and let you know, but I agree that this shouldn't be the default for the Zotero APA, at least not at this point (though I'm not sure - not having the last author seems inconvenient, so I'd consider at least putting a style on the repository.
  • rw001d
    Does anyone know what happened about this issue?

    I thought that it was most likely resolved in the two years since the question had been asked, but when I use the CSL for APA 6th edition, it still lists 7 authors and then "et al." I just installed the most recent version just in case, but it is still formatting with 7 names and then "et al." (Maybe I installed incorrectly?)

    Am I going to have to fix each reference with more than seven authors by hand?

    Thanks!
    :)
    Robin
  • adamsmith
    no, we don't have that covered yet - it's in csl 1.0.1, which will be in the next major - and potentially an earlier - version of Zotero.
    https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/issues/11

    If you're feeling up to it, these specs may actually already work under the hood, so you could try fixing up a custom version of the style for yourself, but you're on your own for that.
  • rw001d
    Thanks!

    I think it might be more my speed just to change the relevant references by hand, but maybe the specs will make more sense to me after I read through everything carefully.

    As long as I know that I'm not needlessly revising by hand, I'm ok with doing that. :)

    Thanks again!
    :)
    Robin
  • elainelevia
    This is resolved, now.
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