Question

Veronica tells another classmate that ΔHAT is congruent to ΔPAM because of the AAA Theorem. Is Veronica correct in what she tells her classmate? Explain your reasoning. Be sure to include important geometry terms like corresponding angles, corresponding side lengths, and triangle congruence in writing your response.

Answer 1

Answer: Veronica is not correct

Explanation:

The AAA theorem, aka the AA theorem, only applies to similar triangles. We cannot use it to prove two triangles are congruent or not. We would need to know info about at least one pair of sides. So based on this diagram, we don't have enough information to know if triangle HAT is congruent to triangle PAM or not.

A similar example to this is to consider two equilateral triangles. Let's call them triangle A and triangle B. If equilateral triangle A has side lengths of 2, and has side lengths of 10, we can see that the triangles are not congruent. However, the triangles are similar because the corresponding angles equal one another. One triangle is a scaled copy of the other. This example is a counterexample as to why the AAA theorem is not a valid congruence theorem.