The noun dispersion refers to the effect that occurs when various elements separate from their origin or their nucleus and expand in space or time. Its antonym that best defines it could be concentration, which is that which is accumulated in a single place or time.
In relation to human beings
The concept of dispersion in the human context has three different meanings. First, it refers to population dispersal, a phenomenon that occurs when people live in large tracts of land far removed from each other and not in a single community.
Sometimes dispersion is spoken of to refer to the abandonment of a territory for some reason (the diaspora of the Jewish people is a clear example in this regard).
Finally, dispersion is spoken of as a personal attitude or as a way of being and, in this sense, when someone does not focus on what they are doing, they are said to be a dispersed person. This way of being can be symptomatic and is what happens with attention deficit syndrome or ADHD and can be treated with medication or combined with some psychological treatment.
In any case, people with dispersed behavior can have problems when executing their actions or starting their personal projects.
In some specific cases, one can speak of the dispersal of the troops of an army or the dispersal of protesters.
Other uses of the concept
In the field of mathematics, this term is also used and with it the distance of any data with respect to the mean of those same data is determined. This use is very common in the terminology of statistics and mathematical analysis.
In the language of physics there are three types of scattering:
1) particles moving in a certain direction,
2) in the terminology of optics to refer to the scattering of light in space that allows us to observe reality in one way or another and
3) acoustic dispersion, which is one that shows how sound waves spread through the air.
In biology it is used in two senses:
1) dispersion in terms of seed propagation (which can be through wind or rain or through pollination by bees) and
2) the dispersal of any animal population.
In chemistry dispersion occurs when some substances are displaced or diluted.
Photos: Fotolia - Honzakrej / Cmon
