Question

Observe the figure to the left of the dotted line and to the right of the dotted line and state whether they are mirror halves of each other or not.

A. Left image is reflected to the right and hence they are mirror images of each other
B. Left image is not reflected to the right and hence they are not mirror images of each other
C. Left image is partially reflected to the right and partially not reflected
D. Can’t specify

Answer 1

Hint: Learn about the formation of an image in front of a plane mirror. Learn about the properties of the image for a plane mirror to solve the question.

Complete step by step solution:
The object given here is a superposition of a triangle and trapezium.
Now, when an object is placed in front of a mirror the image of it is inverted with respect to the object.
So, an object is placed in front of the mirror, the image of it gets inverted, which means horizontal points of the objects are placed inversely.
Now, for example, if we put a stick making some angle with the horizontal the image of it will be inverted as shown

As you can see the image is inverted from left to right.
So, if we place one half of the object in front of the mirror the image will be inverted as shown below:

So from here, we can see that one half of the object is the mirror image of the other.
Hence, the left image has reflected on the right and hence they are mirror images of each other.
Hence, option(A) is the correct answer.
So, the correct answer is “Option A”.

Note: These types of objects are called symmetrical objects as one half is the mirror image of the other. The image formed in a plane mirror is always a virtual image. The horizontal points of the image are only inverted. Vertical points of the image remain unchanged. There are objects which do not invert when placed in front of a mirror.