More tan half of all volcanoes consist wholly or largely of basalt.

Basaltic volcanoes are found

in all tectonic settings. They follow both convergent (volcanic arc) and divergent (oceanic rift)
plate boundaries, occur at hot spots and areas where crustal extension is taking place, and are
developed on a vast scale on the ocean floors .This chapter describes their occurrences on land.
A bsaic relationship is that some volcanoes (called polygenetic) erupt repeatedly, whereas other
volcanoes (called monogenetic) are born, erupt once only , and then die. Polygenetic volcanoes
have a sufficiently large and persistent magma supply rate that an ascending magma batch will
preferentially follow the still-hot pathway of the preceding batch. Conversely, a volcano is
monogenetic if the magma supply is so small or episodic that any pathways have cooled down
and are no longer favored routes for the next magma batch.