Answer: Associative Property of Addition
Step-by-step explanation: The statement 7 + (4 + 4) = (7 + 4) + 4 represents the associative property of addition. Notice that the addends or the numbers we are adding are the same on both sides of the equals sign.
But on the left side, 4 and 4 are grouped together and on the right side, 7 and 4 are grouped together.
The <em>associative property of addition</em> says that when we are adding more than two numbers, the grouping of the addends does not affect the sum.
Here, the order operations tells us to begin inside the parentheses. So we have 4 + 4 which is 8 and 7 + 8 is 15.
On the right side, notice that 7 + 4 is 11 and 11 + 4 is also 15.
In general terms, we can write the associative property of addition as
(a + b) + c = a + (b + c) where <em>a</em>, <em>b</em>, and <em>c</em> are variables that can represent any number.
