---
title: "Explain the concept of recursion and provide an example of a recursive algorithm."  
description: "Explain the concept of recursion and provide an example of a recursive algorithm."  
author: "Steilla Mitchel"  
published: 2023-06-13  
updated: 2023-06-16  
canonical: https://www.mindstick.com/forum/158726/explain-the-concept-of-recursion-and-provide-an-example-of-a-recursive-algorithm  
category: "data structure"  
tags: ["algorithm", "data structure"]  
reading_time: 1 minute  

---

# Explain the concept of recursion and provide an example of a recursive algorithm.

[Explain](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/157854/what-is-system-debugging-explain-some-system-debugging-tools-used-in-modern-computer-systems) the [concept of recursion](https://www.mindstick.com/forum/158955/explain-the-concept-of-recursion-in-python-and-provide-an-example) and provide an example of a recursive algorithm.

## Replies

### Reply by Aryan Kumar

Sure. [Recursion](https://answers.mindstick.com/qa/111681/what-is-recursion-and-when-should-i-use-it) is a programming technique where a function calls itself. This can be used to solve problems that would be difficult or impossible to solve with a loop.

Here is an example of a recursive algorithm that prints the Fibonacci sequence:

Python

```plaintext
def fib(n):
    if n == 0 or n == 1:
        return n
    else:
        return fib(n - 1) + fib(n - 2)
```

The `fib()` function works by breaking down the problem of finding the nth Fibonacci number into two smaller problems: finding the (n - 1)th Fibonacci number and finding the (n - 2)th Fibonacci number. The `fib()` function then solves the smaller problems and then adds the two solutions together to get the solution to the original problem.

Here is an example of how the `fib()` function would be used to print the first 10 Fibonacci numbers:

Python

```plaintext
for i in range(10):
    print(fib(i))
```

This code would print the following output:

Code snippet

```plaintext
0
1
1
2
3
5
8
13
21
34
```


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Original Source: https://www.mindstick.com/forum/158726/explain-the-concept-of-recursion-and-provide-an-example-of-a-recursive-algorithm

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