Question
What is calorimetry? What is a calorimeter?
Answer
What is calorimetry?
Calorimetry is the measurement of heat transferred during a physical or chemical process. A calorimetry experiment usually measures a temperature change in the surroundings or in a calibrated calorimeter and uses that change to determine how much heat was exchanged.
What is a calorimeter?
A calorimeter is the apparatus used to measure the heat involved in a physical or chemical process. It is designed to limit unwanted heat exchange with the external environment and to connect an observed temperature change to an amount of heat.
For a material of known mass and specific heat capacity,
If the calorimeter is represented by a calibrated overall heat capacity,
In an idealized isolated calorimetry calculation, heat lost by one part of the system is equal in magnitude and opposite in sign to heat gained by another. Real calorimeters are not perfectly insulated, so high-accuracy work may require calibration and correction for heat absorbed by the apparatus or exchanged with the environment.
Evidence boundary
This answer gives the general chemistry meanings of calorimetry and calorimeter. The correct thermal model for a specific experiment depends on the apparatus and operating condition; coffee-cup calorimeters are typically treated as constant-pressure devices, while bomb calorimeters operate at constant volume. No experimental measurements are supplied in this pre-lab question.
Sources
These references support the concepts and methods used in the explanation above.