Semi-colions in APA 6th

PeterSmith
I have two citations, namely:

Oram, R. (2007). New Zealand’s freedom from distance. Reinventing paradise: How New Zealand is starting to earn a bigger, sustainable living in the world economy (pp. 18-33). Auckland, NZ: Penguin Books.
Oram, R. (2011). Reinventing paradise. Unpublished manuscript, Auckland, NZ.

When I use them together (without the author name) I get (2007;20011). I would expect (2007, 2011). The names seem identical in Zotero. Any ideas? (it was okay in earlier versions.
  • fbennett
    edited April 3, 2011
    A semi-colon is what is specified in the CSL style file. The name is elided before the second citation in your example because the authors are identical; but it is not possible in CSL 1.0 to specify a different delimiter to use between collapsed citations. I don't know about other CSL implementations, but I'm sure I never implemented such behavior in citeproc-js. We talked about it, but nothing along these lines made it into the specification. Does the APA guide have a specific rule on this? A formal requirement would be required, if you want to see this behavior adopted by the CSL design group.
  • PeterSmith
    edited April 3, 2011
    So, to be clear, if I were to use those two citations together, then I would expect (Oram, 2007, 2011), but what I actually get is (Oram 2007; 2011) --- or if I'm not using the author's name I would expect (2007, 2011), but what I get is (2007; 2011).

    To make sure I'm not imagining things, I've rechecked this by going back to an old version of a file where I find, for example:
    Jarzabkowski (2003a, 2004a, 2005)

    In the current version of the file it's been reformatted as:
    Jarzabkowski (2003a; 2004a; 2005)


    I've gone back to the APA Publication Manual (6th edition) and in section 6.16 (page 177-179) on "Two or more works within the same parentheses", it gives an examples of:

    Training materials are available (Department of Veterans Affairs, 2001, 2003)
    Past research (Gogel, 1990, 2006, in press)
    Several studies (Derryberry & Reed, 2005a, 2005b, in press-a; Rothbart, 2003a, 2003b)

    So, how do I make a formal requirement for this change?
  • ajlyon
    This is a formal request-- thanks for pinning down the concrete requirements.
  • adamsmith
    Will do this Monday or Tuesday - thanks for looking this up. The new processor is more rigorous in how it interprets some aspects of styles, so some things that were not thought through in old styles come to light now.
  • adamsmith
    I need help with this:
    To clarify what APA wants:
    1. Two completely distinct works in one citation are separated by a semicolon:
    (Berndt, 2002; Harlow, 1983)

    2. Two works by the same author are collapsed to the year, the year is separated by a comma:
    (Oram, 2007, 2011)

    3. Where multiple citations by the same author are part of a larger group of citations, a semicolon is set between different authors:
    (Derryberry & Reed, 2005a, 2005b; Rothbart, 2003a, 2003b)

    By setting delimiter=", " in layout and after-collapse-delimiter="; " in the citation options I can get 2. and 3., but 1. will be wrong. It seems I can only get 1. by setting delimiter="; " which then gets 2. and 3. wrong.
    Am I missing something or did we overlook this with csl?
  • fbennett
    edited April 6, 2011
    You're not missing anything; the use case cannot be covered with current options, unfortunately. This will take time to sort out. I'll carry it to the CSL tracker.
  • adamsmith
    OK, thanks.
    PeterSmith - this won't get fixed quickly then. I'll leave the style as is - it seems preferable to me to get the semicolon between different authors right consistently.
  • adamsmith
    Frank - easiest solution would seem to be a separate year-collapse-delimiter option, no?
  • bdarcus
    edited April 6, 2011
    As I say on the ticket, I think the explanation here is misleading, and I'm still not convinced it's a limitation in CSL (if it is though, it needs to be fixed ASAP):

    https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/issues/40/#comment_964999
  • adamsmith
    agree - my description of the problem was misleading, but I really don't think it's possible with csl.
  • PeterSmith
    The logic, as I see it, is that different authors are separated by semi-colons, whereas works by the same author are separated by commas.
  • adamsmith
    exactly right. That was an oversight in csl 1.0 - it will be fixed, the sense is pretty soon, but not as quickly as a simple style fix.
  • fbennett
    In the short term, this can be fixed in the processor with a hard-coded comma delimiter between cites to the same author (which Rintze has identified as being close to the behavior of the 2.0.9 processor). This won't play well with Asian languages, but discussions are proceeding on the CSL side to allow greater flexibility.

    More soon.
  • fbennett
    I've checked in a fresh version of the processor that hard-codes a comma between cites by the same author. The revised processor should appear in the next release of Zotero (2.1.6) when it appears.
Sign In or Register to comment.