Question

What is difference between lateral displacement and lateral shift?

Answer 1

when a ray of light passes through a glass slab of a certain thickness, the ray gets displaced or shifted from the original path. This is called lateral shift/displacement.


Both are the same thing

Answer 2

$\large\tt\underline{\red{Answer :-}}$

When a denser medium is kept between two parallel faces inside a rare medium and a ray falls upon one of the two parallel faces reflects into the denser medium and comes out of another surface becoming parallel to the incident ray.

In the successive reflection the deviation at first surface is reversed at second surface but the emergent ray deviates literally.

The distance to what an emergent Ray devited from the direction of incident ray when suffers refraction at two parallel surfaces is called as lateral deviation/ displacement.

The lateral displacement/deviation increase with the increase in

• thickness

• angle of incident

• optical density