Use when building tables and figures for an American Political Science Review (APSR) manuscript so exhibits are self-contained, accessible, and count toward the word budget correctly. APSR word counts include tables, figures, and printed footnotes, so exhibits must earn their space. Designs exhibits; it does not run the analysis.
NewMaintained
Automatic
◆Research pack
Last verified 8/15/2026
What it changes
Passed 20 of 22 test cases with the skill, and 20 of 22 without it.
Without skill91%
With skill91%
Checks it passed that the model alone missed
The response states that online appendix tables and figures do not count against the main text word count.
1 fixed19 passed either way1 still failing1 broke
Pass-rate lift
0 pp
Tokens
+15%
Agent turns
0%
Response time
-37%
Model gemini-3.6-flashMeasured 8/15/2026v120 of 22 cases passed with skill
Tokens, turns and time describe resource use, not a dollar price.
See it in action
A test case the skill fixed. Same model, same prompt, with and without the skill.
Prompt
We need to trim our manuscript for APSR compliance by deciding which tables and figures remain in the text versus moving to the online supplementary material. Please analyze our draft exhibits and format your advice into these sections:
1. Main exhibit overview and rationale for figure vs table structure
2. Self-contained validation (checking titles, axis labels, notes, sample size, and units)
3. Accessibility check for colorblindness and grayscale clarity
4. Main text versus appendix split and word budget implications
5. Reproducibility confirmation matching the master script output
6. Suggested next step in the pipeline.
What was checked, without and with the skill
Checked
Without skill
With skill
The response states that main text tables and figures count against the APSR word count.
Passed
Passed
The response states that online appendix tables and figures do not count against the main text word count.
Missed
Passed
The response requires distinct line patterns or point symbols alongside color coding for accessibility.
Passed
Passed
case-03 · gemini-3.6-flash · 8/15/2026 · answers are capped and redacted
What's inside
The instructions your model reads when the skill loads.
SKILL.md69 linessingle file
Tables & Figures (apsr-tables-figures)
Exhibits are where an expert reviewer checks whether the result is real. At APSR they also cost
words: the word count "includes tables, figures, and footnotes that appear in the published text"
(it excludes the reference list and online appendices). So every exhibit must pull its weight.
When to trigger
Designing the main results table/figure or a key descriptive exhibit
Deciding what belongs in the article vs. the online appendix
A reviewer found an exhibit unclear, mislabeled, or non-self-contained
Trimming to the word cap by moving exhibits to the appendix
Principles
Self-contained. A reader should understand each exhibit from its title, axis/column labels, and
note alone — without hunting through the text. State units, sample, N, and what the estimate is.
Figures over dense tables for effects. Coefficient/forest plots, marginal-effects and
predicted-probability plots, event-study and RD plots communicate magnitude and uncertainty better
than a wall of coefficients. Show intervals.
Accessible. Colorblind-safe palettes; legible in grayscale; no chartjunk, no 3D, no needless
color. Reviewers and readers must parse it quickly.
Main text vs. appendix. Keep the few exhibits that carry the argument in the article; move
balance tables, full specifications, and robustness grids to the online appendix (excluded from
the word count). This is also how you fit under ~11,000 / ~7,000 words.
Reproducible. Each exhibit is generated by the master script; numbers match the deposited
reproducibility package exactly (the editors re-run it — see apsr-transparency-and-data-policy).
Discipline-specific exhibits
Maps for geographic/spatial variation; network diagrams where structure is the point.
For qualitative work: timelines, causal-process diagrams, evidence tables linking claims to sources.
Execution bridge (StatsPAI / Stata MCP)
Generate exhibits from the fitted result, not by retyping numbers (the usual source of
body-vs-supplement drift). Full map: execution-with-mcp. APSR is general-interest political science — observational causal designs (DiD/IV/RDD) and survey/field experiments alike; cluster by the right unit and foreground identification.
Tables:etable (multi-model columns) or did_summary_to_latex straight from the
result_id.
Use when building tables and figures for an American Sociological Review (ASR) manuscript. ASR excludes tables and figures from the 15,000-word count but still expects them to be clear, self-contained, and ASA-formatted. Designs exhibits; it does not run the analysis.