I am using Endnote x3 and I am in the final portion of my dissertation using APA 6. I am having a problem with a cite that uses the first initial and last name in the citation. It is showing as “B. Davis” instead of “Davis”. I have tried to erase it and do it again, replace the entry in the authors section of the reference and it still returns after I save and close the document. It shows back up when I open it again. How do I get this to correct?
Display of a primary author’s first initial may occur to distinguish different authors having the same last name. So you might first check your EndNote library to see if there’s more than one “Davis” reference and whether it’s the same or different author. If the same author, check if the name is the same in the Author field for both references.
Changing the display of the author’s name (e.g., initials, last name only, etc). is controlled by the output style’s Author Name setting. Erasing or deleting won’t change the format. Instead you will need to adjust the settings to obtain a permanent change. The APA 6th output style is correct “out of the box” or downloaded from the EndNote website but you could check tto see if the “Author Name” setting for the citations section of your output style – is correctly set to: Last Name Only.
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Go to the EndNote toolbar, select Edit > Output Styles > Edit APA 6th.
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In the APA 6th output style dialog box, locate the Citations section then click “Author Name” (see attached image). Check that the setting is Last Name Only. Also note the “use initials” setting is selected.
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Close the output style. If you modified the style note that the changes will be saved to a new file named APA 6th Copy so adjust both EndNote and MS Word to use the new output style file.
