Definition of "reactance" [re•act•ance]

• Electricity Opposition to the flow of alternating current caused by the inductance and capacitance in a circuit rather than by resistance. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "To distinguish the two kinds of reactance, that due to the capacity is called _capacity reactance_ and that due to inductance is called _inductive reactance_."
• "According to a field of study called reactance theory, writes Dr. Cialdini, Whenever free choice is limited or threatened, the need to retain our freedoms makes us desire them as well as the goods and services associated with them significantly more than previously."
• "The degree in which any current is opposed by inductance is termed the reactance of that inductance."