I’m confused about this concept and hoping someone can explain what I’m doing wrong
So when we have a small positive ion and a small negative ion they form a strong ionic bond as the outer electron is closer to the nuclei and all that so this increases the lattice enthalpy as we need more energy to break this bond
However, when we have a small positive ion and a LARGE negative ion, there is a larger polarising effect and this polarising effect means that the compound has some covalent character and thus the lattice is stronger and more energy is needed to break the bond
I feel like it’s a contradiction because how are both small and big negative ions resulting in stronger lattice?
I hope the question makes sense