University of Central Florida (UCF) COP3330 Object Oriented Programming Final Practice Exam

In the context of class methods and instance methods, the keyword that is most often contrasted with "self" is "static."

When working with object-oriented programming, "self" refers to the instance of the class itself within instance methods. These methods operate on the data contained within a specific instance, allowing access to instance variables and other instance methods. In contrast, static methods do not operate on an instance of the class; instead, they are associated with the class itself. Static methods cannot access instance variables or instance methods directly and do not require an instance of the class to be invoked.

This distinction is fundamental in understanding how class and instance methods behave differently concerning the state of the object. Class methods and static methods typically use the class-level data and are used for functionalities that are not tied to a specific instance's state. Thus, "static" serves as the relevant contrasting term to "self" in this context.