I do not know how energy released from an atom can be used to explain ionic bonding or covenant bonding. Pleas help!!

Question

I don't know how electron affinity is related to bondings

Answer 1

Ionic bonding is when one atom (a metal) loses an electron, and another atom (non metal) gains that electrons.  The metals (on the left side of the periodic table) have rather low ionization energies, and the non metals have high ionization energies. So, it is easy to remove an electron from the metal, and not so easy to remove it from the non metal.  The non metal also has a high electron affinity, so it will attract the electron.  So, that's how you get an ionic bond.  Both the metal and non metal become more stable as they try to attain a noble gas configuration.

 

Covalent bonding is when electrons are shared, usually between two non metals.  The non metals have high ionization energies, so it is  difficult to remove their valence electrons. They also have high electron affinities. They will attract electrons, and thus tend to share valence electrons with other non metals. This creates the covalent bond, again which results in the atoms being more stable.