Hybridization of Oxygen Atom in H2O?

[justadream]

I understand that the central atom in water (the Oxygen atom) undergoes hybridization to form 4 sp3 hybrid orbitals. My question is: Why is the hybridization of Oxygen even necessary to form water?

Oxygen has 6 valence electrons so it has 2 p orbitals that contain only one orbital. Thus, it seems to me that each Hydrogen could simply share the electron from each of the 2 p orbitals that contain a single electron. Why does Oxygen have to hybridize to form sp3 orbitals in water?

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[cheesier]

I understand that the central atom in water (the Oxygen atom) undergoes hybridization to form 4 sp3 hybrid orbitals. My question is: Why is the hybridization of Oxygen even necessary to form water?

Oxygen has 6 valence electrons so it has 2 p orbitals that contain only one orbital. Thus, it seems to me that each Hydrogen could simply share the electron from each of the 2 p orbitals that contain a single electron. Why does Oxygen have to hybridize to form sp3 orbitals in water?

The answer is the same as it is for most structural problems in chemistry: the structure (in this case sp3 hybrdization) is the way it is to reduce repulsion. Water would be linear if the hydrogen shared an electron with the p orbitals and all of the electrons would be closer together.

 

[Erythropoietin]

Yes it's all due to VSEPR theory.

 

[chemtopper]

I understand that the central atom in water (the Oxygen atom) undergoes hybridization to form 4 sp3 hybrid orbitals. My question is: Why is the hybridization of Oxygen even necessary to form water?

Oxygen has 6 valence electrons so it has 2 p orbitals that contain only one orbital. Thus, it seems to me that each Hydrogen could simply share the electron from each of the 2 p orbitals that contain a single electron. Why does Oxygen have to hybridize to form sp3 orbitals in water?

you can not explain many of the properties like bond angles ,bond lengths etc without hybridization.