Error comparison, follow-up from Andrea Robare

While it is true the print edition of the APA Concise Rules Style Manual does not contain sample papers, it does cover style rules as well as provide examples, tables, figures, etc. and this is where we found most of the errors. We purchased all of our 6th ed. APA manuals during the summer—1st printing. It may be that the APA has replaced material in the Concise Rules Style Manual with the second printing material, but I can tell you that we indeed have two copies of the APA Concise Rules Style Manual that are loaded with grammatical, stylistic, punctuation, spelling and other errors.

Error comparison, Concise Rules and full Manual

Andrea Robare at Southern Vermont College Library reports that her office has done a detailed comparison of the Concise Rules, 6th edition and the Publication Manual. The organization of the two books is different, which complicates the process. Here is her report:

As promised we at SVC have completed a comparison of the APA Publication Manual correction sheet (printed from the APA website) with the 6th ed. Concise Rules of APA Style Manual and have found that the APA Concise Rules Manual has the SAME mistakes that the Publication Manual does, which stands to reason if material from the first printing (which appears to be the case here) of the APA Publication Manual was used for the 6th ed. APA Concise Rules Style Manual.

Since the Concise Rules Style Manual is arranged differently than the APA Publication Manual, the errors are located in different sections. The bulk of the example errors are located in Ch. 8 of the Concise Rules book; chapter 7 as well as chapters 4, 5, 6, the appendix and the references section of the APA Concise Rules Style Manual has mistakes also. We did not compare the “Nonsignificant Typographical Errors” from the APA corrections sheet, rather we concentrated on the more significant errors, but it stands to reason that these “nonsignificant” errors would be present in the APA Concise Rules Manual as well.

I did a brief look-see on the APA Style site and found this, which would seem to directly contradict Andrea's findings:

Concise Rules of APA Style is not in error. Most of the errors in the first printing of the sixth edition of the Publication Manual occurred in the sample papers, which are available to Concise Rules readers online, but are not included in the book. The remaining typographical errors that occurred in the first printing of the sixth edition of the Publication Manual were not duplicated in Concise Rules. http://www.apastyle.org/manual/corrections-faqs.aspx#concise

I'd welcome input from others to clarify this. My library does not own a copy of the Concise Rules.

More about the Concise Rules

Some people are reporting finding errors in the Concise Rules book that came out to accompany the new Manual. Southern Vermont College Library has decided to do a detailed analysis comparing the two products and will post a report as soon as available. I'm picking up their reports on Libref-L but have asked to post the results here when available.

Mixed responses to the APA exchange offer

People are generally pleased to see APA's exchange offer. Clearly once they decided to respond, the message sent was a thorough and generous one. A few issues that seem to be cropping up:

1. The offer does not extend to the Concise Guide. Here's what I've read:

   What are people who have the 6th ed. Concise rules of APA style doing with them as the content is taken from the 6th ed. APA style manual?
   

2. Some first printing owners who would like to exchange are reaching persons within APA who have apparently not yet gotten the message about the program. Here is a sampling of posts I've seen: 
   

   • We just sent back three copies we purchased through Blackwell.  The APA person I spoke to on the phone did want to know where we purchased the copies from, but it did not affect the return offer.
   • A warning to you all. I called this afternoon & they wanted my invoice # . I purchased it from a store for cash 3 months ago & when I told them this their response was why don't I go back to the store & ask for the invoice #? After a bit of discussion I convinced them that an in-store cash transaction does not generate a retrievable # of any kind 3 months later. The point is they are not making it easy for you if you purchased it outside of APA.

3. Libraries are going to have to answer APA style questions while the exchange is occurring. Here's what folks are doing:
   

   • We have been pointing people to the Citation Machine, which says that it does use the 6th edition: http://citationmachine.net/index2.php?reqstyleid=2
   • We brought the 5th edition back on Reserve and Reference.
   • Our library put the 5th edition back in reference and pulled the 6th edition out. Our cataloger also suppressed the record for the 6th edition in our OPAC.

The official APA announcement

I have seen this over the signature of more than one person from APA, so I believe this is the "official" response to the situation.

I apologize for the delay in response!  We regret the errors that are present in the 6th edition of the Publication Manual, and the inconvenience this has caused you.  We are working on ways to make it right.

We have produced a detailed corrections summary which supplies the error list in a user-friendly presentation.  This document notes all the known errors in the Manual and puts them in context for greater understanding.  A PDF version of the corrections summary supplement is available now from a link on the APA homepage ( http://www.APA.org ).  A printed version of the supplement will also be available by November 2 through the APA Service Center. Please call 800 374-2721 for more information.

Many people have found that the corrections supplement meets their needs; if you find, however, that it doesn’t meet yours we will send you a replacement copy of the second printing of the Manual at no cost to you. (The second printing corrects all the known errors.) We are making this replacement process available to individuals and institutions who have purchased the manual. In order to receive a replacement manual you must return your current copy of the 6th edition to APA no later than December 15, 2009.  We would like to make this transaction as cost neutral to you as possible, so efforts are being made to provide you with pre-paid postage you can use to return the book to us.  We expect this process will be available the first week in November.  If you are interested in a replacement copy please contact the APA Service Center at your convenience for further information. Service Center staff can be reached at: 800 374-2721 from 8:30 AM- 6:30 PM (EST) M – F. Email correspondence can be directed to order@apa.org.

Thank you again for taking the time to write to us. It is our desire to meet your needs.

Regards,

Elizabeth Ekback
APA Electronic Publishing Systems Support

Service Center
American Psychological Association
750 First Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002-4242

Phone: 800-374-2721 ext 5510 (US and Canada) or 202-336-5600 ext 5510 from outside the US -- during regular business hours, 8:30 AM- 6:30 PM (EST)Monday through Friday.
Email: order@apa.org

APA has apparently agreed to allow exchanges!

This news from the Chronicle of Higher Education has been on many lists today. 

Hell hath no fury like a style-guide user scorned. When the American Psychological Association published the sixth edition of its Publication Manual, in July, it didn't take long for APA style mavens to pick up on errors and inconsistencies—and to start complaining on e-mail lists and blogs.

The objections became so loud that the organization has now agreed to replace the offending copies with a corrected second printing...

The cumulative outrage finally carried the day. The association has just announced that it will "recycle" remaining softcover copies of the sixth edition. Anyone who gets in touch with the association between November 2 and December 15 and asks for a replacement will receive a free copy of the emended second printing, according to Rhea Faberman, director of communications. (She recommends that people contact the APA's service center to submit those requests.)

Here is the information for the APA Service Center as posted by Suzy Westenkirchner:
APA Main Contact
Mailing address: American Psychological Association, 750 First Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002-4242
Telephone: (800) 374-2721 or (202) 336-5500M
Rhea Faberman’s phone number is 202-336-5709
Contact the Service Center, Monday through Friday, between the hours of 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Ambassador Books will sell libraries the second printing

Arcadia University librarian Karen Kohn reports that Ambassador Books http://www.absbook.com,  (phone  631-770-1010 or 800-431-8913) rep Connie Angello has agreed to honor an order for the APA Manual that specifies second printing.   Whether they would do that for a library that did not have an existing relationship with them is still unknown, but it's one more place to try.

Other library vendors: Coutts and Ingram

I have some information from two other vendors:

Ingram says they have no way of checking whether it is the first or
second printing before mailing it to us - we'd have to just order it and
take our chances. -- dated 10/21/09

Coutts just sent us ed. 6 & it was the 1st printing.  dated 10/24/09 (spiral binding)

A sampling of other responses to the situation

Here's a taste of what I've heard about the APA's stance on the Manual as originally printed. Forwarded in an attempt to make sure readers know details of the issue and what others are doing to attempt to influence the outcome.

From an Libref-L post by Bryan Carson:

As you may have heard by now, the recently-released 6th edition of Publications Manual of the APA contains a large number of errors, mostly in the examples--which of course are the parts of the manual that most people use. In many instances the rules do not match the examples. These defects are contained in the first printing of the manual. The second printing is reportedly correct. However, many libraries purchased the 1st printing, and many bookstores are still selling the printing with defective information.

At this time, the APA has refused to allow customers to return their 1st printing copies or to exchange them for corrected copies. The attitude appears to be that affected customers are welcome to shell out more money and buy the corrected copies, but that APA does not see itself as bearing any responsibility for putting out an accurate product.

Dr. John Foubert at Oklahoma State University has organized a campaign to boycott the 6th edition until all customers have been made whole. He created a Facebook group entitled "Boycott the APA Manual, 6th Edition." I urge those of you on this list who purchased the defective copies to join the Facebook group, and to sign on to Dr. Foubert's boycott...

This link came from EBSS-L and Carol Wright

You might be interested to read the article - and *especially the comments*  - from
Inside Higher Ed http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/10/13/apa

Yankee's got it!

Our Yankee sales rep just got back to me with word on ordering the Manual from them.  Here's what she said:

The 2nd [printing] of the cloth (9781433805592) and spiral (9781433805622) are available and that is was in the warehouse currently in Momence.  If you order either of those you will get the corrected 2nd [printing].

Here's the rub, the 2nd [printing] of the paper is not due until mid - late November, so you want to order one of the other two bindings.