Problem with Character Styles being overwritten when applying Paragraph Styles

Question

I'm having a problem with Word for Mac regarding styles. I take other people's Word documents, identify local formatting (Italic, Bold, and Bold Italic, for instance, applied by hitting the buttons in the Ribbon), swap those for Character Styles of the same formatting, and then apply Paragraph Styles. Been doing this for years and have and no issues until recently. But starting in February, my Character Styles started being removed, visually, when I apply Paragraph Styles. For instance:

My cursor is in the "iii" line, showing that Bold Italic as a Character Style is applied to that text (while the Bold Character Style is applied to the text "Northeastern Writers"). When I apply a Paragraph Style to that Paragraph, the text looses it's formatting, at least visually:

According to the Current Style readout, the Bold Italic Character Style is still applied, but it no longer shows that it is applied. At some point in February, this started happening. Also in February, I started using an M1 Mac, so it could be Word, or it could be because of Apple Silicon, though that seems unlikely. I updated to Word for Mac 16.59 yesterday and unfortunately, this is still occurring.

I am aware of the "Automatically Update" Style setting, and this is not turned on for the style I applied (Heading- A) or any of my styles:

Nor is the "Automatically update document styles" setting turned on for this Document Template:

Anyone else experiencing this? Can anyone else reproduce this? Finally, any idea on how to make it stop? It's driving me nuts.

I should also point out that this is an intermittent problem. It doesn't happen for every paragraph I apply a Paragraph Style to, but it happens to most.

Answer 1

A sample document would help us help you.

Why a sample file is important for troubleshooting. How to do it.

A few general rules:

• Bold is a toggle attribute. If you turn it on in a paragraph style and apply a character style with the bold attribute, it toggles to not bold.
• Applying a paragraph style to a paragraph containing direct formatting or a character style will delete that formatting if it covers at least half of the paragraph.
• The format of automatic numbers is controlled not in style definitions but by the Define New MultiLevel List dialog.

Some references:

• Understanding Styles in Microsoft Word (my page)
• Outline Numbering in Word for macOS by John Korchoke

Edited by author to strikeout "or formatting as a character style."

Answer 2

Thank you for your reply Charles. I've shared a Sample Document on Dropbox which you can download here:

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/xeucckx8bb8pcrwy10x1u/SampleDocument.docx?dl=0&rlkey=pn886uhf1tera21was9cf7yxj

It's nothing more than the word "Word" typed 6 times. You said that "Applying a paragraph style to a paragraph containing direct formatting or a character style will delete that formatting if it covers at least half of the paragraph," but that is not my experience. Try this:

Open my Styles Pane

Apply the Character Style "Bold" to the first "Word"

Apply the Paragraph Style "Text- No Indent" to the whole paragraph

When I do this, no problems. The paragraph has its style applied and the Bold character style is still applied to the first "Word" and appears bold.

Now try this:

Apply the Character Style "Bold" to the first 2 "Words"

Apply the Paragraph Style "Text- No Indent" to the whole paragraph 

This time, the paragraph style is applied, but the first 2 Words are no longer Bold, at least visually. With the cursor in the text of the first 2 words, the "Current Style" field lists them as "Bold + Not Bold". And if you hit the "Select All" button right under that, it selects the first 4 Words, even though the second 2 "Words" never had a Character Style applied to them.

Here's a video of the issue as well:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/9nfhq49py6qp0bb/SampleDocumentProblem.mov?dl=0

I'm stumped. If this is normal behavior, then it's new. Word never used to act like this.

Answer 3

I was apparently mistaken about a paragraph style overriding a character style. I struck that language out of my reply.

I am not seeing the behavior you are, though, with the sample document. I tested it in both Word 365 and in Word 2010.

Do you see this behavior if you open Word in safe mode?

Open Office apps in safe mode on a Windows PC - Microsoft Office

By the way, Word comes with a built-in character style which is Bold in most \[Quick\] Style Sets. That is the Strong style. Likewise, Emphasis is Italics in most Quick Style Sets.

Answer 4

I am getting inconsistent results here, which makes me think that something strange is going on.

I tried your example with your custom paragraph style and the built-in Strong character style (which is formatted as bold).

If I select the paragraph and (re-)apply the paragraph style, the formatting sometimes gets lost from the character style, but the character style remains applied to text. (Also, the style definition of the character style is left intact.)

I can consistently reproduce this when I re-apply the paragraph style, as opposed to applying it for the very first time. The whole paragraph must be selected.

If I set the option to "Prompt to update style" option (at File > Options > Advanced), choosing the "Reapply the formatting of the style to the selection" overrides the character style (but it does not remove the char style from text).

The built-in paragraph styles appear to work as expected, though.

My testing was made in Word for Windows, version 2202.

Answer 5

I am getting inconsistent results here, which makes me think that something strange is going on.

I tried your example with your custom paragraph style and the built-in Strong character style (which is formatted as bold).

If I select the paragraph and (re-)apply the paragraph style, the formatting sometimes gets lost from the character style, but the character style remains applied to text. (Also, the style definition of the character style is left intact.)

I can consistently reproduce this when I re-apply the paragraph style, as opposed to applying it for the very first time. The whole paragraph must be selected.

If I set the option to "Prompt to update style" option (at File > Options > Advanced), choosing the "Reapply the formatting of the style to the selection" overrides the character style (but it does not remove the char style from text).

The built-in paragraph styles appear to work as expected, though.

I am seeing the same thing. Except I tried with the built-in heading 1 and also lost the formatting from the character style when reapplying it. Have not tried other built-ins other than Normal, which does not trigger the Reapply dialog in my system.