"Next Paragraph" Style not Working!

[Art Davis]

I am using a template with various paragraph styles defined, but have
started having a problem. For instance, when I apply a given heading style,
write the paragraph, then hit enter to start a new paragraph, the "new
paragraph" style doesn't work.

I have tried going to "format>styles and formatting," then opening the given
paragraph style and clicking "modify." The correct following style is
listed in the "style for following paragraph" menu window.

I have tried putting my cursor in the following paragraph in my document,
changing it manually to the desired style, and then going into the "styles
menu" and clicking "update," but it doesn't work.

Can anyone help?

Art

 

[Klaus Linke]

Hi Art,

The same question just came up in the docmanagement group, and I'll paste
Suzanne Barnhill's suggestion below:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In a previous instance of this reported problem, when the user sent me the
problem document, it turned out that the style in question had been
applied as a character style, and the underlying paragraph style was
Normal or something else. The behavior when Enter was pressed therefore
followed the behavior defined for the underlying paragraph style. Try
selecting the paragraph and pressing Ctrl+Spacebar to remove any direct
font formatting (including character styles) and see if the style shown in
the Style box is still the paragraph style you were expecting. If it is,
press Ctrl+Q.

Also, make sure that when you place the insertion point at the end of the
text, there are not spaces following it (display nonprinting characters so
you can see them). Unless you have the insertion point immediately before
the paragraph mark, the next style will not be applied; otherwise Word
considers that you are splitting the existing paragraph.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you are using Word 2007, I would strongly recommend to have the option to
"deactivate linked styles" checked (at the bottom of the "styles and
formatting" task pane).
IMHO, applying one paragraph style on top of another is an abomination, and
allowing it was maybe the worst design decision of the Word developpers
ever.

Klaus