What is a primary consequence of multipath propagation?

• A. Inter-symbol interference
• B. Increased data rate
• C. Lower latency
• D. Larger bandwidth

Answer: (A)

Multipath propagation means the signal reaches the receiver through several paths, each with a different delay and sometimes different amplitude. When all these delayed copies combine, they can overlap in time and either reinforce or cancel parts of the waveform. The overlapping of symbols from different time instants distorts the received signal in a way that causes inter-symbol interference, which is the main consequence you’re dealing with in many radio channels. This interference degrades the ability to distinguish individual symbols, leading to higher error rates.

The other options don’t describe what multipath primarily does: it doesn’t inherently increase data rate, and multipath can actually hinder performance rather than reduce latency or enlarge bandwidth, since the channel’s bandwidth is not determined by multipath but by the spectrum and signaling scheme.