Depending on the application, resistor inductance might be easily disregarded, especially in DC circuits. However, parasitic resistor inductance can be a significant factor in high-frequency AC applications. The reason for this is that the impedance of a resistor rises with the applied voltage frequency due to the increase in its reactance. In AC circuits, electrical impedance is the measure of the opposition that a circuit presents to the passage of a current when a voltage is applied. The impedance of the resistor rises with the voltage frequency increase because the resistor acts as a resistor and inductor. This increase is usually negligible, but in some applications is quite significant.
Electrical loads include resistive loads and reactive loads. Resistive loads are used to convert electrical power into heat. Ideally, a resistor only possess resistive load that all the electrical power applied to the resistor is dissipated as heat. While reactive loads, can be capacitive and inductive, convert electrical power into a electric or magnetic field and store it temporarily before returning it to the rest of the circuit. Capacitive loads store energy in the form of an electric field, while Inductive load store energy in the form of a magnetic field.
Ideal resistors are dissipate electrical power as heat and have zero reactance and be referred as zero inductance. It is obvious that electrical devices are not ideal in practice and all resistors have small parasitic inductive reactance.
Parasitic inductance usually reveal itself in resistors with inferior properties. RF applications or microwave applications in general are particularly sensitive to parasitic effects.
