Question

Can somebody please explain how “this” works in jQuery. I tried to find some information on the net, but because “this” is used a lot in his usual meaning I couldnt find anything good.

I would like to be able to change the background of a list element (<li>) onclick without giving each list element an id.

Answer 1

$("li").click(function() {
   $(this).css("background-color", "red");

});

Here is an example. $(this) refers to the JQuery object, this refers to the regular DOM object that was clicked on.