Final answer:
Oxidation of organic molecules involves increasing carbon-oxygen bonds and decreasing carbon-hydrogen bonds, which typically results in an increase in the oxidation number of carbon.
Step-by-step explanation:
The oxidation of an organic molecule requires a decrease in the number of carbon-hydrogen bonds and an increase in the number of carbon-oxygen bonds. During the oxidation process in organic chemistry, a carbon atom is said to be oxidized when a carbon-hydrogen bond is replaced by a carbon-oxygen bond, which generally increases the oxidation number of carbon. This is because an oxygen atom typically has an oxidation number of -2 (unless it's elemental or attached to fluorine), and hydrogen generally has an oxidation number of +1 (unless it's attached to a metal). Therefore, forming bonds with more electronegative atoms like oxygen typically increases the oxidation number of carbon, signifying oxidation.