Solvents as complex environments can induce considerable effects on the physical, chemical and biological properties of solute molecules. In this work, solvent polarity sensitive characteristics of two tautomers of different azo compounds were studied by using of spectroscopic and Z-scan techniques. In this case, nature and various molecular interactions contribution on the spectral behaviors of azo and hydrazone forms of selected samples were investigated by Kamlet-Abboud-Taft and Catalan models. Moreover, the obtained results of Z-scan indicate that self-defocusing, saturable and reverse saturable absorption features of azo dyes depend highly on substituents and molecular environment polarity characteristic. In this case, media polarity properties have the same effects on the third order nonlinear absorption coefficient and nonlinear refractive index values. Therefore, by measuring one of the third order nonlinear optical coefficients, it is possible to predict solvent polarity effects on the other nonlinear optical coefficient. The calculated dipole moments with high values in the molecular excited state also reveal the probability of molecular charge transfer characteristics. In this case, by excitation process, sample I indicate high dipole moment values in comparison to other samples. Therefore, the results can give useful information about the application of selected samples for designing various optical devices.
