Using Paragraph and Character Styles Flashcards

What is the key difference between a paragraph style and a character style in InDesign?

Answer: Paragraph styles apply to entire paragraphs while character styles apply to selected text runs

Paragraph styles format the whole paragraph; character styles format only selected characters within it.

Which attribute can only be set by a paragraph style, not a character style?

Answer: Text alignment (justification)

Alignment is a paragraph-level attribute and cannot be defined in a character style.

What does it mean when a paragraph style name shows a plus sign (+) next to it in the Paragraph Styles panel?

Answer: Local overrides have been applied to the selected text

A plus sign indicates the text has local formatting that differs from the defined style.

How do you clear all local overrides from text using a paragraph style?

Answer: Alt/Option-click the style name in the panel

Alt/Option-clicking the style name reapplies it and removes local overrides.

What is the benefit of basing one paragraph style on another (parent style)?

Answer: Changes to the parent automatically cascade to children unless overridden

Basing styles creates a hierarchy so parent edits ripple down to dependent styles.

Which panel lets you apply a character style to selected words?

Answer: Character Styles panel

Character styles are applied from the Character Styles panel.

What happens if you apply [None] as a character style to selected text?

Answer: It removes the character style attributes, leaving paragraph-level formatting

[None] strips character-style attributes while paragraph formatting remains intact.