Short-circuit evaluation says, the second argument is executed or evaluated only if the first argument does not suffice to determine the value of the expression: when the first argument of the AND (&&) function evaluates to false, the overall value must be false; and when the first argument of the OR (||) function evaluates to true, the overall value must be true.

For the following test condition and isTrue and isFalse function.

var test = true;
var isTrue = function(){
  console.log('Test is true.');
};
var isFalse = function(){
  console.log('Test is false.');
};

Using logical AND - &&.

// A normal if statement.
if(test){
  isTrue();    // Test is true
}

// Above can be done using '&&' as -

( test && isTrue() );  // Test is true

Using logical OR - ||.

test = false;
if(!test){
  isFalse();    // Test is false.
}

( test || isFalse());  // Test is false.

The logical OR could also be used to set a default value for function argument.

function theSameOldFoo(name){ 
  name = name || 'Bar' ;
  console.log("My best friend's name is " + name);
}
theSameOldFoo();  // My best friend's name is Bar
theSameOldFoo('Bhaskar');  // My best friend's name is Bhaskar

The logical AND could be used to avoid exceptions when using properties of undefined. Example:

var dog = { 
  bark: function(){
    console.log('Woof Woof');
  }
};

// Calling dog.bark();
dog.bark(); // Woof Woof.

// But if dog is not defined, dog.bark() will raise an error "Cannot read property 'bark' of undefined."
// To prevent this, we can use &&.

dog&&dog.bark();   // This will only call dog.bark(), if dog is defined.