oh, ok. My book says that electronegativity is the reason why HF is the weakest, which to me makes sense. A stronger bond is harder to pull apart, and something that is harder to dissociate is a weaker acid... I tried to apply this thinking to the -COOH's and it backfired... There's way too...
The reason I chose CH3COOH as the strongest acid is because I remembered reading in my book that for binary acids HF was less than HCl which was less than HBr which was less than HI. But I guess the electronegativity matters here because the bond is stronger for a higher electronegativity but...
Oh that kind of makes sense. It's not that the molecule is strongly held together, but the three Flourine on the left pull the rest of the molcule and the H is kind of dangling off on the end. I couldn't get the K vaules from there but if anyone could post them just to ensure that CF3COOH has...
oh, so for that reason CF3COOH is the strongest acid out of the five? And I assume that CH3COOH is the weakest do to the same reasoning... Is there anywhere I can find the Ka values of these compounds? Thanks
Carboxyl acid strength and electronegativity... How do they relate??
Here is a question that I had on a recent chem II exam.
Which is the strongest acid?
A. CH3COOH
B. CF3COOH
C. CCl3COOH (Cl for chlorine, not Carbon 13)
D. CBr3COOH
E. CI3COOH
I selected choice A because the...