How to make citations in a word document superscript?

When citing in Vancouver style, it is more common to display citations as ¹ or ⁽¹⁾ rather than Word's default of (1) when using the built in citation manager.

Is there a way to force Word to display them in this alternate format? This website would seem to suggest not, however I'm wondering if anyone here has any thoughts? I'm not adverse to changing the citation style in program files, I would just appreciate some advice on how to do it assuming there is no easy fix that I'm missing.

Rory

Posted 2012-11-01T17:18:04.007

Reputation: 515

Answers

I have concluded that this is not directly achievable in the current version of Word.

The workaround I am using at present, which is also a much superior solution to the inbuilt referencing in word as a whole concept, is to manage references through End Note X6. Whilst the bibliographies produced are less pretty, they are better formatted and offer easier customisation.

Most importantly, and for reasons I'm not entirely sure about, an End Note "Cite While You Write" citation stays superscript throughout editing and printing if you tell it to do so just once per citation.

I am still looking for a way to make this the default style in End Note.

Rory

Posted 2012-11-01T17:18:04.007

Reputation: 515

The Word built-in reference tool has a style called "IEEE" which has similar citations except that the number is not in superscript. IEEE format

Inorder to make the citation in superscript, you should modify the style file which is in the %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Bibliography\Style folder.
Back up the IEEE2006OfficeOnline.xsl file, and find the string <xsl:template name="Citation">.
In this segment, you can find <body> and </body>, change these to <body><xsl:element name="sup"> and </xsl:element></body>.
Then the citation looks like this below. modified IEEE format

Brainor

Posted 2012-11-01T17:18:04.007

Reputation: 23

Because I have spent so much time to the "style" file of Word's Reference utility for my doctoral degree paper, I can post my modified xsl file or help you modify it if anyone need help. – Brainor – 2019-08-13T09:19:28.100

I have the same issue, but I have found out that some Youtuber create a Macro to make all citations to be superscripted. To use it, just use the Word citation tool to add a new citation, then start the macro function.

Kudos to Ismail Fahmi : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56HWKBuM-zg

Here's the code

Sub ReferenceNumberStyle()
Application.ScreenUpdating = False
Dim Fld As Field
For Each Fld In ActiveDocument.Fields
  If Fld.Type = wdFieldCitation Then
    Fld.Code.Font.ColorIndex = wdBlack
    Fld.Code.Font.Superscript = True
    Fld.Result.Font.ColorIndex = wdBlack
    Fld.Result.Font.Superscript = True
  End If
Next
Application.ScreenUpdating = True
End Sub

Tested. It works for me in Word 2019

Kunanon S.

Posted 2012-11-01T17:18:04.007

Reputation: 1

-1

I think Word uses a special style to display citations, you could physically alter that style.

gt6989b

Posted 2012-11-01T17:18:04.007

Reputation: 543

3Could you maybe explain how to go about doing this? – slhck – 2012-11-01T17:39:58.147

Hi! Unfortunately as far as I can see citations are using the "normal" style - as is the rest of my text. I suppose I could create a new style for the remainder of my text and then modify the normal style to be superscript but it may be a pain if the citations match the newly created style when inserted directly into the text. – Rory – 2012-11-01T17:49:20.847

Indeed my above suggestion does not work as a lot of the styles inherit from normal, meaning they too also go into superscript. – Rory – 2012-11-01T19:03:28.720

@Rory You are right, perhaps the only way then is to create your own style and format all citations that way... At least when you want to change it, only 1 place of change will be required. Sorry to be of no help... – gt6989b – 2012-11-01T19:47:27.137