The equilibria, YPhOH + Br− = YPhOH-Br−, involving 26 differently substituted phenols, were determined with a pulsed high pressure mass spectrometer. The −ΔG0 evaluated from the equilibrium constants represent the hydrogen bond free energies in YPhOH-Br−. These data and data for X− = Cl− and I−, determined previously in this laboratory, are used to examine the substituent effects on the hydrogen bonding. It was found that the hydrogen bond energies in YPhOH-X− increase approximately linearly with the gas phase acidities of the phenols, YPhOH. This is in agreement with earlier observations that showed the bond energies in AH-B−, where AH were oxygen and nitrogen acids and B− closed shell anions, increase with increasing acidity of AH.A detailed analysis of the substituent effects, which is possible for YPhOH-X−, shows that the relationship with the acidity of AH can be divided into two parts. One is the increasing extent of actual proton transfer from AH on formation of the hydrogen bonded complex. Such proton transfer occurs in YPhOH-X− only for the series X− = Cl−. The second effect, which occurs for Cl− and is dominant for Br− and I−, is not directly related to the acidity of the phenols (or AH in general) but depends on a similarity of the substituent effects on the acidity and the stabilization of YPhOH-X− (or AH-B− in general). The dominant contribution to YPhOH-X− stabilization in this case is due to the field effects of the substituents, i.e., π delocalization plays only a small part. Therefore, the correlation with the acidity of YPhOH, where π delocalization is important, is not very close. Keywords: hydrogen bonding, substituent effects, ion–molecule equilibria, stability constants, thermochemistry.
