How to truncate citations after first author?

Question

My citations should be in the format Author et al., 20xx. I understand from prior answers that it maybe because it is the first time citing a multiauthored manuscript in my text, but I don't see risks of ambiguity here in going with the et al. since the very first citation.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[backend=biber, style= authoryear-icomp, 
dashed=false,
citestyle=apa,
maxbibnames=1,maxcitenames=1,uniquelist=false,
sorting = nyt, natbib]{biblatex}
\DeclareLanguageMapping{american}{american-apa}


\addbibresource{sample.bib} %Imports bibliography file

\begin{document}
\section{First section}

Items that are cited: \textit{The \LaTeX\ Companion} book \cite{latexcompanion}, The Einstein's journal paper \cite{einstein} and the Dirac's book \parencite{einstein, einstein1} are physics related items. Next, a citation about \textit{The \LaTeX\ Companion} book \cite{latexcompanion}.

\medskip

\printbibliography
\end{document}

simple.bib

@article{einstein,
  author =       "Albert Einstein",
  title =        "{Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter K{\"o}rper}. ({German})
                 [{On} the electrodynamics of moving bodies]",
  journal =      "Annalen der Physik",
  volume =       "322",
  number =       "10",
  pages =        "891--921",
  year =         "1905",
  DOI =          "http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/andp.19053221004",
  keywords =     "physics"
}

@article{einstein1,
  author =       "Albert Einstein",
  title =        "{Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter K{\"o}rper}. ({German})
                 [{On} the electrodynamics of moving bodies]",
  journal =      "Annalen der Physik",
  volume =       "322",
  number =       "10",
  pages =        "891--921",
  year =         "1905",
  DOI =          "http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/andp.19053221004",
  keywords =     "physics"
}

@book{dirac,
  title={The Principles of Quantum Mechanics},
  author={Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac},
  isbn={9780198520115},
  series={International series of monographs on physics},
  year={1981},
  publisher={Clarendon Press},
  keywords = {physics}
}

@book{latexcompanion,
    author    = "Michel Goossens and Frank Mittelbach and Alexander Samarin",
    title     = "The \LaTeX\ Companion",
    year      = "1993",
    publisher = "Addison-Wesley",
    address   = "Reading, Massachusetts",
    keywords  = "latex"
}

@online{knuthwebsite,
    author    = "Donald Knuth",
    title     = "Knuth: Computers and Typesetting",
    url       = "http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~uno/abcde.html",
    keywords  = "latex,knuth"
}

@inbook{knuth-fa,
   author = "Donald E. Knuth",
   title = "Fundamental Algorithms",
   publisher = "Addison-Wesley",
   year = "1973",
   chapter = "1.2",
   keywords  = "knuth,programming"
}

@book{knuth-acp,
   author = "Donald E. Knuth",
   publisher = "Addison-Wesley",
   title = "The Art of Computer Programming",
   series = "Four volumes",
   year = "1968",
   note = "Seven volumes planned",
   keywords  = "knuth,programming"
}

@article{ctan,
    author  = "George D. Greenwade",
    title   = "The {C}omprehensive {T}ex {A}rchive {N}etwork ({CTAN})",
    year    = "1993",
    journal = "TUGBoat",
    volume  = "14",
    number  = "3",
    pages   = "342--351",
    keywords  = "latex"
}

The apa style has quite strict rules for citing multiple authors. It's not intended as a style whose behaviour is designed to be modified. It might be better to use one of the standard authoryear styles instead. — Alan Munn, Jul 22 '19 at 03:47
I wanted to change it because, while the journal I am submitting to requires apa6, prior articles do not seem to have the full list of authors. But at this point, I'll follow your suggestion and leave it as-is. — Dambo, Jul 22 '19 at 03:50

moewe · Accepted Answer · 2019-07-22T20:16:45.137

Usually (that is to say with the standard styles), maxcitenames=1 and uniquelist=false (see Set limit to one author when using "et al." in biblatex) should be more than enough to produce

Author et al. 2000

for all citations with more than one author, but your situation is slightly more involved.

For medium-length name lists APA style wants to see all names on the first citation and "et al." only on a subsequent citation of the same work. See for example https://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2011/11/the-proper-use-of-et-al-in-apa-style.html as well as the relevant passage in the APA manual.

biblatex-apa implements the requirements of the APA manual as closely as possible in biblatex and of course also implements this feature. Since biblatex-apa was specifically written to follow the APA rules it is not that easy and also not really recommended to change this behaviour.

The following suggestion is a bit of a hack

\documentclass[british]{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{babel}
\usepackage{csquotes}

\usepackage[style=apa, backend=biber, citetracker=false]{biblatex}

\makeatletter
\let\blx@imc@ifciteseen\@firstoftwo
\makeatother

\addbibresource{biblatex-examples.bib}

\begin{document}
\autocite{sigfridsson,aksin,herrmann}

\autocite{sigfridsson,aksin,herrmann}

\printbibliography
\end{document}

In the MWE, however, you are already using a mixture of biblatex-apa and non-APA biblatex standard style authoryear-icomp, so I recommend you just ditch biblatex-apa completely.

\documentclass[british]{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{babel}
\usepackage{csquotes}

\usepackage[backend=biber, style=authoryear-icomp, 
  maxnames=1, uniquelist=false,
  dashed=false,
  natbib]{biblatex}

\addbibresource{biblatex-examples.bib}

\begin{document}
\autocite{sigfridsson,aksin,herrmann}

\autocite{sigfridsson,aksin,herrmann}

\printbibliography
\end{document}

Note that maxbibnames=1, maxcitenames=1, can be simplified to maxnames=1 and that sorting=nyt is already the default for style=authoryear-icomp. I would probably use maxnames=2 or maybe even maxnames=3 to avoid the slightly infelicitous "Sigfridsson et al." for "Sigfridsson and Ryde", this will still cut down lists longer than maxnames to minnames et al., but the short two- or three-author lists are left alone.

How to truncate citations after first author?

1 Answers1