A correlation between enthalpy and entropy has been observed for a wide variety of reactions. The correlation is significant because, for linear free-energy relationships (LFERs) to hold, one of three conditions for the relationship between enthalpy and entropy for a series of reactions must be met, with the most common encountered scenario being that which describes enthalpy–entropy compensation. The empirical relations above were noticed by several investigators beginning in the 1920s, since which the compensatory effects they govern have been identified under different aliases.