Question

The concept that other classes should not alter an object's attributes—only the methods of an object's own class should have that privilege

Answer 1

Encapsulation is an object-oriented programming principle that keeps an object's attributes private, only allowing them to be accessed or modified through the object's own methods.

Step-by-step explanation:

The concept being described is known as encapsulation. This is a fundamental principle of object-oriented programming (OOP), which states that an object's attributes should be private or hidden from other classes, and only accessible through its own methods. In other words, the internal state of an object should be shielded from direct external modification, with the class providing public methods (also known as getter and setter methods) to read or alter that state in a controlled manner.

For example, let's say we have a class called Car. The Car class has private attributes such as speed and fuelLevel. It provides methods such as accelerate() and refuel() to change these attributes without allowing direct access. This ensures that the usage and modification of these attributes are done following the class's intended design, maintaining the integrity of the object's state.