In Word 2007, how to change the paragraph format of the first list level without affecting the other levels?

Question

I have a multi-level bulleted list in word. I want that the items on the highest level are visually separated, by adding additional line spacing after each of them. I also want that on the second level, there is no space between items. Following formatting shows what I want

    - Item level 1 
         * Item level 2
         * Another Item level 2 

    - Another Item level 1 

But I could only increase spacing between all items, meaning that there was an empty line between items Level 2 too.

Any ideas how to make it? Thanks.

Answer 1

From We have multi-level list where we try to change the line spacing :

The list formatting does not include line spacing. To have different line spacing for each level in the list, associate a unique paragraph style (with the desired line spacing defined) with each numbering level.

Here's how to do that: Place the insertion point in the first top-level item of your list. On the Home tab, click Multilevel List and then click Define New Multilevel List. In the dialog box, first click the More button to see all options (if necessary). Then, for each level, choose a style name in the "Link level to style" box. When you are done, click OK.

Note that assigning a paragraph style for each numbering level has been the recommended approach for Word versions 97 and later. The difference is that Word 2007 no longer allows you to access the numbering options via the top-level paragraph style (which was the recommended approach in older versions.

The new approach offered by Word 2007 is to create a list style, via Home tab | Multilevel List | Define New List Style. Once created, a list style appears at Home tab | Multilevel List (under "List Styles"). The advantage of list styles is that they can be modified via the Modify Style dialog box like any other style, but note that list styles do not replace assigning paragraph styles to numbering levels.