Question

The girl in the image walks along the balance beam with her arms out to help her balance. Why does she do this?

Answer 1

Sample Response: The girl walks along the balance beam with her arms out to increase her rotational inertia. By increasing her rotational inertia, she decreases her rotational velocity. This allows her to resist rotation, which means she is able to maintain her balance on the beam.

Answer 2

So that a better balance can be obtained

Step-by-step explanation:

When she lifts his arms she causes her center of gravity to rise, and the further away the center of gravity from the point of rotation (her feet), the greater the rotational inertia will be and it will swing slower allowing more time to adjust and thus be able to maintain the balance easily.

Another example of this case is when we are balancing a body in the extreme of a rod with our fingers, as we can see in the attached image.

Another example of this case is when we are balancing a body at the end of a rod with our fingers. The further the center of gravity of the rotation point (in this case the finger tip), the greater the rotational inertia and the rod will swing more slowly.