Addition Laws in Introductory Physics

Abstract

We propose a unified approach to addition of some physical quantities (among which resistors and capacitors are the most well-known) that are usually encountered in introductory physics such that the formulae required to solve problems are always simply additive. This approach has the advantage of being consistent with the intuition of students. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach, we propose and solve several problems. We hope that this article can serve as a resource paper for problems on the subject.