The text cursor, or caret, is normally in the visible form in applications at the start of its display cycle. It then goes to the flashing sequence once you stop moving it with arrow keys or typing. However, in Word 2011 I'm constantly frustrated because the cursor disappears, or defaults to the invisible state of the flashing sequence, while I'm typing or moving it. This makes it painfully difficult to edit text without using the mouse. As I write this post and keep going back to word I'm noticing that it seems erratic as to what behavior it's acting. I think that it stays in whichever state it was last in, which 50% of the time is invisible.
I've since changed the blink rate to 200ms via changing the default in Word's plist file. This helps a little in my frustration, but the behavior really needs fixed.
Update 2014-09-02
It doesn't appear to be a problem on documents created locally. It seems to be an issue with documents I've got from elsewhere, quite possibly from other operating systems.