You might even see a spark if the discharge of electrons is large enough. The good news is that static electricity can’t seriously harm you. Your body is composed largely of water and water is an inefficient conductor of electricity, especially in amounts this small. Not that electricity can’t hurt or kill you.

current electricity involves a flow of electrons; static electricity involves a single transfer of electrons.

A build up of electrical charge on an object. What CAUSES static electricity? An imbalance of positive and negative charges. You get a shock because millions of electrons go from your finger (built up negative charge) to the doorknob (positive charge).

The number of electrons in electrically neutral matter must be equal to the number of protons, so the fractional number of electrons which have been transferred to our bit of paper as static electricity is: 6.3 X 1010 / 3 X 1023 = 2 X 10-13.

It can create sparks that fly from one object to another. Why is it better not to use metals to create static electricity? (Although it is possible for friction on metal objects to result in some static electricity, it does not really work well.

Depending on your interests, you can make static electricity in several different ways. To make small shocks, you can rub your socks against carpet or rub fur against plastic wrap or balloons. Or, to produce larger shocks, you can build your own electroscope using objects around the house.

Static shocks are more common when it’s cold and dry. This dry, cold air holds less water vapour than warm summer air. So, when you touch something like a metal doorknob or car door, those extra electrons will rapidly leave your body and give you the shock.

By convention, we call one type of charge “positive”, and the other type “negative.” For example, when glass is rubbed with silk, the glass becomes positively charged and the silk negatively charged.

When a glass rod is rubbed with silk, glass rod loses electrons and silk gains electrons. On rubbing together, the glass rod loses 2 electrons and silk gains 2 electrons. Now the glass rod has 8 electrons and 10 protons which makes it positively charged. Silk has 9 electrons and 7 protons making it negatively charged.

Nearly all dust particles in the air are positively charged whereas negative ions are negatively charged. As differently charged items are pulling towards each other, we see the negative ions go to the positively charged dust particles and they stick together to create larger = heavier dust particles.

When the glass rod is rubbed with silk clothes, glass quickly loses electrons, and silk takes electrons out of the glass rod. So after rubbing, the glass rod becomes positively charged and the silk gets negative charge.

When you are rubbing the glass rod with the silk cloth, electrons are stripped away from the atoms in the glass and transferred to the silk cloth. This leaves the glass rod with more positive than negative charge, so you get a net positive charge.

When the glass rod is rubbed with silk, the silk strips electrons from the rod, leaving it a positive charge. When the hard rubber rod is rubbed with wool, it gains electrons from the wool, gaining a negative charge.

The shock you receive when you walk across a carpet and touch a metal surface or when you feel the cling of statically charged clothing are evidence of a static electrical charge. Hair and rabbit’s fur give up electrons easily, whereas polyethylene and Teflon are good at attracting electrons.

How does a rectangular rod become negatively charged and another rectangular rod become positively charged? The 2 rods exchange electrons when a negatively charged balloon in placed near.

In contrast to the attractive force between two objects with opposite charges, two objects that are of like charge will repel each other. That is, a positively charged object will exert a repulsive force upon a second positively charged object. This repulsive force will push the two objects apart.