[21385]

Question:

Answers:


Can someone explain the reasoning behind the answers? Thanks a lot

[agrobert]

What about you explain them and we will help.  Hopefully this is your own answer and you have some rationale for your numbering.  What can you say about resonance and electron density / charge distribution?

[21385]

These answers are not mine....they're the official ones.

For my answer, I actually put them, in order in the question, 1, 3, 5, 4, 2...
I thought the third and fourth one would be most stable because they have the most number of resonance forms. Then, I thought what would stabilize the negative charge, by taking away the negative density. And the chlorine atom would be better than CH3, which would be better than OCH3. I found this order in the substitute benzene reactivity list, which represents which substitutes would donate electrons, and which substitutes would take away electrons.