Valences

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The number of chemical bonds an element or group can form with others
2. The capacity of an atom or radical to combine with other atoms by gaining, losing, or sharing electrons
3. A measure of the combining power of an element or group in chemical compounds

Etymology: Valence, the word chemists use for an atom's bonding capacity, began as a medieval medicine. Late Middle English "valence" meant a preparation made from plants, borrowed from the Latin "valentia", meaning bodily strength, health or vigour. The chemical sense came much later, in the nineteenth century, when the English word "quantivalence" was coined to describe how many bonds an atom can form. The idea reached German through the chemist August Wilhelm von Hofmann, who was passed the English coinage and turned it into "Quantivalenz". German speakers later shortened it to "Valenz", and English took that clipped form back, adding the suffix "-ence" to give "valence". The English word "valence" is therefore a German-influenced term that returned to English with a new meaning, while its older Latin sense of strength survives in the medicinal use it first carried. The plural "valences" is simply the plural of this noun, and its later extension to psychology, meaning a value a person assigns to something, grew from the same chemical sense of combining power.

Synonyms: valency, capacity, role, function, attribute

Antonyms: inactivity, impotence, powerlessness, ineffectiveness, vacuity