Often two (or more) waves travel through the same spot. If you’ve ever listened to an orchestra, you’re hearing the sounds from many different instruments all playing at the same time. If more than two boats are on the lake, their wakes churn up the water together. Here’s how we handle this in physics…
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The principle of superposition states that when waves interfere with each other, the displacement at any location is the sum of the displacements of the waves at that location. Said another way, you simply add up the waves at the same spot to get the resulting amplitude.

Click here to go to next lesson on Interference.

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