Author name in citation

I am a new user of EndNote. In several cases, when I find a citation and add it to my Word document, the citation includes the first authors initials - (K.R. Williams & Guerra, 1998). I have checked my entry in the library, and it seems to be in order. This is happening with several references. Any ideas what i might be doing to cause this problem?

Also, I contacted Tech Support because there are places in the document where I do not need the open parenthesis at the beginning of the citation. For example, I might have a statement and then say (See citation for details). I could not use EndNote and just type the reference as I want it, but then it doesn’t appear in the Reference List. I am told there is not a way to remove the open parenthesis without doing it for all citations :frowning:    

What style are you using?  Is this a case where there are two Williams in 1998 and the style is dictating that they need to be “unabiguated” (is that a word?) by inclusion of the authors initials? 

Part two, question:  I am not exactly sure why you are trying to lose the open parenthesis, but could you achieve what you want by inserting the reference and hide year and author (no reference) or make the reference hidden text? 

But, if “citation” should be the citation?  In which case the unformated reference should look like {see\Lastname #RecNo, YEAR for details}.   

Regarding the first authors initials - (K.R. Williams & Guerra, 1998)…I saw a similar problem about a week ago.  Most in-text citaitons were formatting correclty, that is without first initials.  However one or two included the first initials, even though it was the same autho r- e.g. (Smith, 2008) but also (L.L. Smith, 2007).  This was EndNote’s way of distinguishing two different authors, except that the authors were the same person.  After looking at the specific record that generated the first initials, I discovered there was a <space> after the authors’s name in the EndNote  record.  EndNote was reading this as a different author. Once we corrected the offending EndNote records, the manuscript formatted correctly.

I checked the entry in the library, and made sure there was no space after the name. I still get the initials when I insert the first reference only. Subsequent citations (et al) to not include the initials.

Try to copy and past the author from one of the others to the wierd citation, just to be sure there isn’t some very subtle difference?

Great suggestion! I still cannot see the difference in the two, but it works so I’m a happy camper. Thanks.