An inverse or negative relationship is a mathematical relationship in which one variable, say y, decreases as another, say x, increases. For a linear (straight-line) relation, this can be expressed as y = a-bx, where -b is a constant value less than zero and a is a constant. For example, there is an inverse relationship between education and unemployment — that is, as education increases, the rate of unemployment decreases.
Inverse relationships and their counterpart, direct relationships, are widely used in the physical sciences to describe the relationship between two variables in an equation.
In economic graphing, two variables are said to have an inverse relationship if the graph line slopes downward to the right.
Famous quotes containing the words inverse and/or relationship:
“Yet time and space are but inverse measures of the force of the soul. The spirit sports with time.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Friendship is by its very nature freer of deceit than any other relationship we can know because it is the bond least affected by striving for power, physical pleasure, or material profit, most liberated from any oath of duty or of constancy.”
—Francine Du Plesssix Gray (20th century)